Alexandra Imelda Cecelia Ewan Burke (born 25 August 1988) is an English singer and winner of the fifth series of UK television singing talent show The X Factor. Burke had previously auditioned for the 2005 series of the show, where she reached the last seven in her category but was not selected for the live shows. |
Burke’s prize, as winner, was a recording contract with Simon Cowell’s Syco record label, whose parent company is Sony BMG. The contract has a stated value of £1 million, of which £150,000 is a cash advance and the remainder is allocated to recording and marketing costs.
As of 15 December 2008, Burke became the current European record holder for single sales over a period of twenty-four hours, selling 105,000 copies of her debut single, "Hallelujah", in one day.[3] The figure beats that of her X Factor predecessor, Leona Lewis, who previously held the record for selling 82,000 copies of her single, "A Moment Like This", over 24 hours.[3] "Hallelujah" went on to become the Christmas number one single of 2008. It was also announced as the top-selling song of the year on the BBC Radio 1 Chart Show on 28 December 2008, beating The X Factor finalists’ song "Hero". It is the first time that an X Factor winner has topped the end of year chart in the UK with their winner’s single. Sales of "Hallelujah" passed 1 million by 9 January 2009, making Burke the first British female solo artist to sell a million copies of a single in the UK.[4] Her debut album, Overcome will be released on 19 October 2009 and in the US at a later date with the lead single entitled "Bad Boys" featuring Flo Rida being released in the UK on 12 October 2009 and in the US at a later date.
