Sony ME eyes Dubai concert for Susan Boyle

Global singing sensation Susan Boyle is being lined up to tour Dubai on the back of a planned album deal with a major record label, Arabian Business can reveal.

The head of Sony Music Entertainment Middle East, Kevin Ridgely, said the 48-year-old, dubbed the “hairy angel” by the British press, is close to signing a record contract with the label that would likely include a world tour.

“We will be releasing an album, although I don’t know when, with Susan Boyle,” he told Arabian Business. “We have a relationship with Simon Cowell’s production company, and there is already talk about it. And she will tour.”

Ridgely has already earmarked a potential venue in Dubai for the unlikely star.

“The Palladium [Dubai Media City] would be a perfect place for people who want to sit and see a concert like that,” he said. “Her popularity is incredible.”

The singing spinster became an internet sensation after winning over a mocking audience in the first episode of TV series "Britain’s Got Talent".

Despite being greeted by a sneering Simon Cowell, a man known for his acid tongue, Boyle’s rendition of "I Dreamed A Dream" from the musical Les Miserables stunned the judges and brought the crowd to their feet.

The reclusive Scot, who lives alone with her cat, Pebbles, has since become an internet sensation. Her audition has notched up more than 100 million unique hits on YouTube, more than president Obama’s inauguration. Hollywood star Demi Moore is a fan, having admitted via Twitter that Boyle’s singing made her “teary”.

In possibly the strongest signal the former church worker has made it, she has also appeared on the Oprah Winfrey Show, where she told the chat show host that her new-found fame was “like a dream come true”.