X Factor winner and Duffy top the year's charts

Alexandra Burke and Duffy have rounded off an eventful 12 months by being declared the top-selling musicians of the year, it emerged yesterday. Burke, winner of The X Factor, whose cover of Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah was the Christmas No 1, sold 888,000 copies through downloads and CDs - 311,000 of them in the last week. According to figures from the Official Charts Company, Burke also pushed the X Factor Finalists' charity single, Hero, into second place with sales of 751,000. It was also a good year for X Factor judge Simon Cowell: the top two singles were released through Syco Music, the company he set up, as was the year's fourth most popular album, Leona Lewis's Spirit. The Welsh singer Duffy saw her single Mercy take the No 3 spot in the year's bestseller chart. It was the only other single to sell more than half a million copies. Duffy's debut album, Rockferry, was the year's bestselling album, racking up 1.685m digital and physical sales, and denying Take That the top spot. The ... (link)