Tony Bennett breaks own record as oldest artist atop Billboard chart

[October 02, 2014]  By Piya Sinha-Roy

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - At 88, veteran crooner Tony Bennett broke his own record as the oldest living artist to land a No. 1 record on the weekly U.S. Billboard 200 album chart on Wednesday with his latest compilation of duets with Lady Gaga.

"Cheek to Cheek," which features New York singers Bennett and Gaga singing classics such as "Anything Goes" and "Let's Face The Music And Dance," sold 131,000 copies in its first week according to figures from Nielsen SoundScan.

Bennett previously set the record for becoming the oldest-living artist to land a No. 1 album in 2011 aged 85, with his compilation "Duets," which included a track with Gaga.

"Cheek to Cheek" is the second compilation of classic songs to top the Billboard 200 chart for the second consecutive week, after fellow New York songstress Barbra Streisand's "Partners" debuted at No. 1 last week.

"Partners" dropped to No. 3 this week, behind country singer Kenny Chesney's "Big Revival," which entered the chart at No. 2 with sales of 130,000.

Other new albums to break into the top ten of the Billboard 200 chart, which measures physical and digital album sales across all genres, include English indie rockers Alt-J at No. 4 with "This Is All Yours" and a cappella group Pentatonix at No. 5 with "PTX, Vol. III."

Blues rocker Joe Bonamassa clocked in at No. 8 with "Different Shades of Blues" and R&B singer Jennifer Hudson rounded out the top ten with her new album "JHUD."

For the week ending Sept. 28, total album sales clocked in at 4.4 million units, down 14 percent from the comparable week in 2013, while year-to-date total sales totaled 175.71 million, also down 14 percent from last year, Billboard said.

(Editing by Mary Milliken and Marguerita Choy)

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