Following her funeral yesterday, Cilla Black’s The Very Best Of has climbed to Number 1 on the Official Albums Chart.
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The entertainer and legendary Blind Date presenter, who died earlier this month, topped the charts with The Very Best Of Cilla Black.
Cilla’s steely edge trumped even Dionne Warwick’s classic original of Anyone Who Had A Heart to top the chart and writer/producer Burt Bacharach was so impressed that he gifted her the classic Alfie. “It’s something she always wanted”.
A year later she went one place higher with Cilla Sings a Rainbow, which was her best chart showing until today.
As her peerlessly phrased take on the much-covered Jesus Christ Superstar favourite I Don’t Know How To Love Him showed, a great, original singer can make the most familiar tune reveal previously hidden depths.
On Thursday just 600 copies separated the top three, with Bullet For My Valentine’s Venom marginally ahead, before ending up in the third spot.
The family opened up the funeral service at St Mary’s church to the public and television cameras on the request that her burial remain private and in a statement from the family, a spokesman said: ‘Having given unprecedented public access, we asked that the burial was to be private for the family.
Paul O’Grady was one of the celebrities who remembered Cilla in a heartfelt speech.
Dan Chalmers, president of Black’s Rhino record label, said: “This Number 1 is a reflection of the special place Cilla Black occupied in the hearts of the British public and a fitting tribute to an icon who shaped popular music and entertainment”.
The album was first released in 1983, before being expanded for a re-release in 2013, with You’re My World among the tracks.
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Black enjoyed six top 40 albums, and 11 top 10 singles – the second highest number for any British female, trailing only Shirley Bassey and Petula Clark, who both had 12.
