Artists
Leona Lewis
On the evening of December 16, 2006, Leona Lewis was announced the winner of The X Factor series three.
Only hours later, her first single was released online. Downloaded more than 50,000 times in 30 minutes, it set a new world record.
On December 24, Lewis had become the fastest selling female artist of all time, outselling the previous record holder with 107,000 copies.
Over the first week, sales exceeded well over 571,000 units and Lewis's debut became the 2006 UK Christmas number one Single.
Choosing the Judy Garland song "Over the Rainbow", taken from the 1939 Hollywood musical fantasy movie "The Wizard of Oz", Leona Lewis's rendition was apparently a perfect selection for The X Factor jury.
Praised by Simon Cowell, Sharon Osbourne and Louis Walsh throughout the series, the 21-year-old singer made it through to the final stages. Receiving approximately 60% of the 8,000,000+ votes, Lewis went on to win the competition.
With record-breaking sales, her fanbase was now huge and an album was expected shortly. Instead of rushing the release, Leona went to the US signing a record deal with Clive Davis, founder of Arista Records and responsible for the success of artists such as Whitney Houston.
Set for release in late 2007, recordings of her debut album now began around the US, as well as in London. One of the songs was the ballad "Footprints In The Sand". Written by Per Magnusson and David Kreuger together with Richard Page, the former lead singer of Mr Mister, the song was yet another result of a successful collaboration initiated in 2006 between the three songwriters.
Titled "Spirit", Leona Lewis' eagerly awaited album was released in the UK on November 12. Instantly reaching #1 on the charts, it also had become the fastest selling debut album in Britain by selling more than 375,000 copies in one week. This marked Lewis's third entry into the record books.
Released in other European countries later this year, "Spirit" reaches the US record stores in early 2008.