Alexandra Imelda Cecelia Ewan Burke (born 25 August 1988) is a British 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 Music Entertainment. 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.
On 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. 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. 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.
Her debut album, Overcome was released on 19 October 2009 and entered the charts at number one. It will be released in the US at a later date. Lead single Bad Boys featuring Flo Rida debuted at number-one in the UK, becoming her second consecutive number-one single.
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