Susan Boyle

In September 2018, Boyle was confirmed to be a contestant in America's Got Talent: The Champions. When asked why she joined the competition, she stated that she wanted to win this time. She performed on 7 January 2019, singing "Wild Horses" from her 2009 debut album I Dreamed a Dream and received a golden buzzer from judge Mel B. She progressed straight to the finals where she sang the song I Dreamed a Dream from her original audition back in 2009.

Boyle's eighth studio album, Ten, was released on 31 May 2019 and features a duet with Michael Ball on the track "A Million Dreams".

On 21 August 2019, Boyle performed on the results show for season 14 of America's Got Talent.

In 2016 Boyle made a cameo appearance in Zoolander 2 where she is ambushed by paparazzi.

In 2015 Boyle was awarded an honorary doctorate in the field of music from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, Glasgow.

Boyle released her sixth album, Hope, in October 2014 in the US and in November 2014 in the UK. The album, whose theme is hope and inspiration, includes a recorded live performance by Boyle of "You Raise Me Up" with the Lakewood Church choir.

Following the release of previous album, Hope in 2014, Boyle took a break during 2015 to "take a little me time and spend time at home with family and friends", and thus the recording of her seventh studio album was postponed to 2016. In October 2016, Boyle announced the release of A Wonderful World.

In November 2014, it was reported that Boyle was dating her first boyfriend, who was "around the same age" as she was.

Boyle made her first acting appearance as Eleanor Hopewell in The Christmas Candle. The film is based on a book written by author Max Lucado about a 19th-century village of simple people in the English Cotswolds in need of a miracle. The film was released on 22 November 2013 in the US and 29 November 2013 in the UK. Talking about her first acting role, Boyle said, "I can't believe I'm making a film. I'm very excited to be a part of The Christmas Candle. Everyone on set is a delight to work with and it's a fantastic experience to be part of the team." In the movie Boyle sings an original song, "Miracle Hymn", the anthem for the film and a track from her album Home for Christmas, which also featured a duet with Elvis Presley singing "O Come All Ye Faithful". The album was released on 29 October 2013 in the US. Previously in television, Boyle starred as herself in I Dreamed a Dream: The Susan Boyle Story and in a 2011 documentary titled Susan Boyle: An Unlikely Superstar. Boyle also starred in a second documentary titled There's Something About Susan in the UK, which first aired on ITV on 12 December 2013. It aired in the US on Ovation Channel under the title Susan Boyle Her Secret Struggle with the premiere on 9 April 2014. In October 2013 American vocalist Johnny Mathis released an album titled Sending You a Little Christmas. The album includes "Do You Hear What I Hear?" a duet performed with Boyle.

In July 2013, Boyle endorsed the Better Together campaign to keep Scotland as part of the United Kingdom in the 2014 independence referendum. In so doing, she stated, "I am a proud, patriotic Scot, passionate about my heritage and my country. But I am not a nationalist", going on to say, "We have still been able to retain our proud identity whilst being a part of Britain."

On 28 August 2013 Boyle travelled down with the Lothian Special Olympics Team to the Special Olympics Great Britain National Summer games in Bath. In the evening she performed at the Opening Ceremony of the Special Olympics GB at the Royal Crescent in Bath, England and also stayed to watch the events and hand out medals to the first day's winners.

On 14 August 2013 it was announced that Boyle would sing at the Prince & Princess of Wales Hospice 30th Anniversary Variety Performance at the Clyde Auditorium in Glasgow on 27 October 2013.

Prior to performing at the International Music Festival "White Nights of St. Petersburg", at the Ice Palace in St. Petersburg, Russia, on 13 June 2013, Boyle visited Children's Hospital Number 17 and presented to the hospital a gift of an anesthetic machine.

It was announced 28 October 2013 that Boyle is a new ambassador for Save the Children UK. Boyle released a music video 8 December 2013 featuring children from the FAST program singing "O Come All Ye Faithful" with Elvis Presley. All royalties will go towards Save the Children UK and money raised in the US will be donated to the Elvis Presley Charitable Foundation.

On 12 May 2012, Boyle returned to Britain's Got Talent to perform as a guest in the final, singing "You'll See". The following day, she performed at Windsor Castle for the Queen's Diamond Jubilee Pageant singing "Mull of Kintyre". Having performed "I Know Him So Well" in a duet with one of her idols Elaine Paige in London in December 2009, Boyle performed with her other musical idol Donny Osmond in Las Vegas in November 2012, singing "This is the Moment", a duet from her album Standing Ovation: The Greatest Songs From the Stage. Boyle's net worth was estimated at £22 million in April 2012. She is known for supporting various charitable causes, and has appeared on the UK charity telethons BBC Children in Need and Comic Relief. As of 2013, she had sold over 19 million albums worldwide and received two Grammy Awards nominations. On 23 July, Boyle performed "Mull of Kintyre" at the Opening Ceremony of the 2014 Commonwealth Games in front of the Queen.

Boyle was raised in Blackburn, West Lothian. Her father, Patrick Boyle, was a miner and veteran of the Second World War who also worked as a singer at the Bishop's Blaize; her mother Bridget was a shorthand typist. Both her parents were born in Motherwell, Lanarkshire, but also have family links to County Donegal in Ireland. Born when her mother was 45 years old, Boyle was the youngest of four brothers and five sisters. She was raised thinking that she had been briefly deprived of oxygen during a difficult birth resulting in a learning disability. However, she was told in 2012–13 that she had been misdiagnosed and has Asperger syndrome with an IQ "above average". Boyle says she was bullied as a child.

Boyle released her fourth album Standing Ovation: The Greatest Songs from the Stage in November 2012. She reportedly took piano lessons as she planned on playing it for the album. A reporter told The Sun "Susan loves the piano and always dreamed of being able to reach a standard which would allow her to play on stage and on her albums." In October 2012 renowned opera star Placido Domingo released his album Songs which included a duet with Boyle of Shania Twain's "From This Moment On".

I Dreamed a Dream opened on 27 March 2012 with fans from all over the world occupying the Theatre Royal, Newcastle, for the opening week. The musical received generally warm reviews. The musical toured the UK and Ireland in 2012.

In 2012, Boyle was diagnosed with Asperger syndrome. She made her diagnosis public in a BBC interview in December 2013.

In November 2012, when asked if she had tried to find love through Internet dating, Boyle said she was too scared, saying: "Knowing my luck I'd go out on a date and you'd find my limbs scattered around various Blackburn dustbins!"

In May 2012 it was reported that Boyle would become patron of the struggling Regal Theatre, Bathgate where she first performed "I Dreamed a Dream".

On 24 October 2012 Boyle, together with the West of Scotland and Edinburgh Garrison Military Wives choirs, launched the Poppy Scotland appeal on the steps of the Glasgow Royal Concert Hall.

In 2012 Boyle was awarded an honorary doctorate for her contribution to the creative industries from Edinburgh's Queen Margaret University, where she obtained a Certificate of Higher Education in caring.

Her debut studio album, I Dreamed a Dream, was released in November 2009 and became the UK's best-selling debut album of all time, beating the previous record held by Spirit by Leona Lewis. I Dreamed a Dream set a record for biggest first week sales by a debut album, according to the Official Chart Company in the United Kingdom. Topping the Billboard 200 for six weeks, it was the second best-selling album of 2009 in the US. In her first year of fame, Boyle made £5 million (£6.8 million today) with the release of I Dreamed a Dream and its lead-off singles, "I Dreamed a Dream" and "Wild Horses". The success was continued with her second album, The Gift (2010), where she became only the third act ever to top both the UK and US album charts twice in the same year, and was followed by Boyle's third album, Someone to Watch Over Me (debuted at #1 on UK charts, #4 on US charts), released on 31 October 2011. Boyle subsequently released her fourth album Standing Ovation: The Greatest Songs from the Stage (reached #7 in UK, #12 in US) in 2012, her fifth album Home for Christmas (fifth consecutive top ten on UK charts) in 2013, and her sixth album Hope (sixth consecutive top twenty on UK and US charts) in 2014.

Boyle performed on the second semi-final results show of the sixth season of America's Got Talent, which aired on 31 August 2011.

Boyle made her first appearance in Australia, on X Factor Australia, on 8 November 2011 and sang "Autumn Leaves".

For three years Boyle has launched the Wee Box campaign for the Scottish Catholic International Aid Fund (SCIAF) in Glasgow, on 9 March 2011, on 21 February 2012, and on 12 February 2013.

In January 2012, Boyle donated a performance dress, which she had worn on America's Got Talent on 31 August 2011, to The Laura McPhee Memorial Fund (Asthma) UK Charity. The dress was sold at auction for £521 and helped raise awareness of the charity.

In November 2009 it was reported that Boyle's rendition of "I Dreamed a Dream" would be the theme song of the anime movie Eagle Talon The Movie 3 which was later released in Japan on 16 January 2010. Boyle performed for Pope Benedict XVI on his tour of Britain in 2010. In May 2010, Boyle was voted by Time magazine as the seventh most influential person in the world. Boyle's original song "Who I Was Born To Be" was the theme song of anime film Welcome to the Space Show, which opened in Japan on 26 June 2010.

On 9 July 2010, Boyle announced that her second album would be a Christmas album entitled The Gift. As part of the lead-up to the album, she held a competition called Susan's Search, the winner of which sang a duet with her on her new CD. The album was released on 8 November 2010.

In November 2010, Boyle became one of only three acts ever to top both the UK and US album charts twice in the same year. On 30 November 2010, in the United States, Boyle performed on ABC's The View singing "O Holy Night" and then on NBC's Christmas at Rockefeller Center program performing "Perfect Day" and "Away in a Manger". During her appearance on The View she was unable to finish her song, stating that she had a "frog in her throat"; she wanted to start the song over but was not allowed to. The audience applauded her anyway and she later performed an unaired version of the song which was uploaded to The View's YouTube account.

In October 2010 Boyle's autobiography The Woman I Was Born To Be – My Story was published.

Although Boyle was not eligible for the 2010 Grammy Awards, its host Stephen Colbert paid tribute to Boyle at the ceremony, telling its audience "you may be the coolest people in the world, but this year your industry was saved by a 48-year-old Scottish cat lady in sensible shoes." There was also earlier controversy, when Boyle was not nominated in any of the categories for the 2010 Brit Awards.

Boyle still lives in the family home, a four-bedroom ex-council house in Blackburn which she purchased from her earnings in 2010. Her father died in the 1990s, and her siblings had left home. Boyle has never married, and she dedicated herself to caring for her ageing mother until her death in 2007 at the age of 91. A neighbour reported that when Bridget Boyle died, her daughter "wouldn't come out for three or four days or answer the door or phone". Boyle is a practising Roman Catholic and sang in her church choir at her church in Blackburn. Boyle remains active as a volunteer at her church, visiting elderly members of the congregation in their homes. On a 2010 episode of The Oprah Winfrey Show, Boyle summarised that her daily life was "mundane" and "routine" prior to stardom.

On 26 January 2010, Boyle sang together with other major artists on the charity recording "Everybody Hurts" put together by Simon Cowell for Haiti Relief for the victims of the Haiti earthquake. On 30 January 2010, Boyle performed at the Indsamling Charity Gala, a telethon for Haiti and Africa held at the Tivoli Concert Hall in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Boyle has appeared on the three major UK charity telethons. On 19 March 2010 she sang for the Sports Relief charity on BBC1. On 18 March 2011 she sang a duet of "I Know Him So Well" with Peter Kay on the BBC's Comic Relief; in addition to the television performance, the duet was sold on CD, DVD, and MP3 download to raise more money for charity. The CD was #21 on the all-time Comic Relief CDs sold. She has performed for BBC Children in Need telethon five times thus far: on 19 November 2010; on 18 November 2011, and on 16 November 2012. on 16 November 2013. on 14 November 2014.

On 10 November 2010, Boyle performed at the Pride of Britain Awards in London. On 19 March 2011 in Glasgow at the Scottish Variety Awards Boyle performed; the money raised was donated to Cash for Kids Charity.

On 16 September 2010 Boyle sang at the Papal Mass performed for Pope Benedict XVI in Glasgow at Bellahouston Park in front of a crowd of 65,000.

In July 2012 Boyle donated a performance dress designed by Suzanne Neville, which she had worn at performances in Madrid on the Ana Rosa Show on 12 February 2010 and in Paris on Vivement Dimanche on 17 February 2010. £6,523 was raised and presented to the Prince's Trust.

Also in June 2013 Boyle donated for auction a performance dress which she had worn on The Oprah Show on 19 October 2010, with proceeds of the auction going to Metro Radio Newcastle England's Cash For Kids Campaign, with all funds raised going to disadvantaged kids across the region. The winning bid was £400.

In the 2010 episode of Futurama, "Attack of the Killer App", it is revealed that Leela has a singing boil named Susan on her butt, who sings "I Dreamed a Dream" and "Amazing Grace".

In September 2010 Boyle was presented with three Guinness World Records which were featured in the Guinness World Records 2011 edition published 16 September 2010. The three records were for Fastest-selling Album by a Female (UK), Most Successful First Week UK Debut Album Sales, as well as Oldest Artist to Reach No. 1 with a Debut Album (US & UK).

On 20 November 2010 Boyle achieved another World Record for Oldest Female at No. 1 on UK Albums Chart with her second album The Gift.

On 20 November 2010 Boyle received two other Guinness World Records due to the success of The Gift, one record being "Only British female artist to top both the US and UK album charts with two releases" and the other being "Most successful Christmas album in the UK" – "On 20 November 2010, Susan Boyle's (UK) album The Gift became the first Christmas album to ever top the UK chart."

In August 2008, Boyle applied for an audition for the third series of Britain's Got Talent (as contestant number 43212) and was accepted after a preliminary audition in Glasgow. When Boyle first appeared on Britain's Got Talent at the city's Clyde Auditorium, she said that she aspired to become a professional singer "as successful as Elaine Paige". Boyle sang "I Dreamed a Dream" from Les Misérables in the first round, which was watched by over 10 million viewers when it aired on 11 April 2009. Programme judge Amanda Holden remarked upon the audience's initially cynical attitude, and the subsequent "biggest wake-up call ever" upon hearing her performance.

Boyle was one of 40 acts that were put through to the semi-finals. She appeared last on the first semi-final on 24 May 2009, performing "Memory" from the musical Cats. In the public vote, she was the act to receive the highest number of votes to go through to the final. She was the clear favourite to win the final, but ended up in second place to dance troupe Diversity; the UK TV audience was a record of 17.3 million viewers.

Boyle's first album, I Dreamed a Dream, was released on 23 November 2009. The album includes covers of "Wild Horses" and "You'll See" as well as "I Dreamed a Dream", and "Cry Me a River". In Britain, Boyle's debut album was recognised as the fastest selling UK debut album of all time selling 411,820 copies, beating the previous fastest selling debut of all time, Spirit by Leona Lewis. I Dreamed a Dream also outsold the rest of the top 5 albums combined in its first week.

In the US, the album sold 701,000 copies in its first week, the best opening week for a debut artist in over a decade. It topped the Billboard chart for six straight weeks and although it narrowly failed to become the best-selling album of 2009, with sales of 3,104,000 compared to 3,217,000 for Taylor Swift's Fearless, it was one of only two albums to sell over 3 million copies in the US, and was also the top selling "physical" album of 2009, with only 86,000 of its sales coming from digital downloads. This has in turn garnered more media attention, as mentioned by People magazine.

On 13 December 2009 she appeared in her own television special "I Dreamed a Dream: the Susan Boyle Story", featuring a duet with Elaine Paige. It got ratings of 10 million viewers in the United Kingdom and in America was the TV Guide Network's highest rated television special in its history.

Websites such as YouTube, Facebook and Twitter have been crucial in facilitating Boyle's rapid rise to fame. The most popular YouTube video submission of her audition garnered nearly 2.5 million views in the first 72 hours. On the day following the performance, the YouTube video was the most popular article on Digg and made the front page of Reddit. Within a week, the audition performance had been viewed more than 66 million times, setting an online record, while on Wikipedia her biography attracted nearly half a million page views. A total of 103 million video views on 20 different Web sites was reached within nine days. The Los Angeles Times wrote that her popularity on YouTube may in part be due to the broad range of emotion packed into a short clip which was "perfect for the Internet". In December 2009, her audition was named the most watched YouTube video of the year with over 120 million viewings, more than three times higher than the second most popular video.

Additionally, Boyle's first on camera interview with Scots journalist Richard Mooney for her local newspaper the West Lothian Courier, was named as YouTube's Most Memorable Video of 2009. The video went viral after being uploaded to YouTube on 14 April 2009.

At the invitation of NHK, a major Japanese broadcaster, Boyle appeared as a guest singer for the 2009 edition of Kōhaku Uta Gassen, annual songfest on 31 December in Tokyo. She was introduced as the ōen kashu (応援歌手 , lit. "cheering singer") by the MCs and appeared on the stage escorted by Takuya Kimura, and sang "I Dreamed a Dream".

In June 2009, BBC Radio 4 broadcast a short story called "I Dreamed a Dream" that was based on a combination of Boyle's appearances on Britain's Got Talent and the political difficulties of the then UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

The 5 November 2009 episode of the show 30 Rock showed recurring character Kathy Geiss (Marceline Hugot) – who has a dowdy appearance – singing in the style of Boyle as Liz Lemon and Jack Donaghy teared up.

In 1999, Boyle submitted a track for a charity CD to commemorate the Millennium produced at a West Lothian school. Only 1,000 copies of the CD, Music for a Millennium Celebration, Sounds of West Lothian, were pressed. An early review by Amber McNaught in the West Lothian Herald & Post said Boyle's rendition of "Cry Me a River" was "heartbreaking" and "had been on repeat in my CD player ever since I got this CD..." The recording found its way onto the internet following her first televised appearance and the New York Post said it showed that Boyle was "not a one-trick pony." Hello! said the recording "cement[ed] her status" as a singing star.

In 1998, Boyle recorded three tracks—"Cry Me a River", "Killing Me Softly", and "Don't Cry for Me Argentina"—at Heartbeat Studio, Midlothian. She used all her savings to pay for a professionally cut demo, copies of which she later sent to record companies, radio talent competitions, local and national TV. The demo consisted of her versions of "Cry Me a River" and "Killing Me Softly with His Song"; the songs were uploaded to the Internet after her BGT audition.

In 1995, she auditioned for Michael Barrymore's My Kind of People.

Susan Magdalane Boyle (born 1 April 1961) is a Scottish singer, who rose to fame after appearing as a contestant on the third series of Britain's Got Talent, singing "I Dreamed a Dream" from Les Misérables.