Maybe it's my age, my listening tastes or that I'm from the UK (or more likely a combination of all 3) but I've never been particularly aware of her music. I'm very aware of her name, her as a personality, as an actress, as a singer and her popularity/success but I've just never really been aware of her albums, songs and music in general, bar a few of her bigger hits. The same goes for Carey & Dion of the supposed "Big 5", it's only the Madonna & Houston catalogues that I know quite well and feel transcended majorly into the mainstream and the general publics eyes & ears, certainly here in the UK.

Anyway, great numbers for Barbara, even if not as high as some had hoped or intimated, given the nature of the industry at the time she started out.

"From the UK, I think it cant be the main reason as the former two ☺, Barbra became a big name in UK in aspect of music with ASIB in 1976, she was the biggest diva in UK during 1976-1982, the yeat her Memories became the first album by female atop year-end with a Brit award, and the second most no1 and the top3 best-selling female behind only "the pop girl of Britain" Madonna. And she was also featured on the top 10 Voices of the Century list by BBC. As a actress, she had received a number of UK award and nominations from BAFTA for her film roles during 60s.
PS:I am a university student from China.
I though "biggest hits" you refer to may be records in her pop/rock years (1971-1984) such as Woman in Love, but she never go back since The Broadway Album, and herself perfer to sing traditional tandards than pop songs on her concert...

I knew she would have around the same number with Whitney Houston. I was right. She has such an amazing feat. For her to produce such massive amount of sales, when she debut at a time when it is extremely difficult for singers to go global, especially female singers. Is just amazing.

Martin, judging by your picture I suspect you are somewhere in your mid 30s or late 30s. So, I wouldnt be surprised that you would not be aware of her albums and songs and so on. I am in my late 20s and none of my friends knew her songs, a lot of them dont even know who she is (Im from Asia). I only knew about her and her songs because my mom is a huge Barbra Streisand fan, and she always played her greatest hits collection when I was a kid. I always find her to be an extremely2 talented singer, but not particularly a fan of her type of music, except for some very good songs. Anyway, to me she is the most talented female singers of all time. She is somewhat a forgotten legend. People seems to forget how talented she was as a singer.

Koerenas Albelia: Yes, I’m not disputing the successes she had in the UK or doubting that she was a household/big name but her catalogue I would say is just not as recognisable or known as say Madonnas, Houstons, even acts like Kate Bush or Tina Turner (in the UK) have probably slightly better known & more recognisable songs, from around the late 70’s to late 80’s.

The only tracks I really know by her are Woman In Love, You Don’t Bring Me Flowers & Memory. In all truth, she was pretty irrelevant in the UK up until ASIB and even after that, she had pretty mixed success with her studio albums, with 1977’s Superman #32, 1978’s Songbird #48, 1979’s Wet #25, 1984’s Emotion #15, 1988’s Till I Loved You #29, all failing to light up the charts. She did have a nice little run of singles, with 1977’s Evergreen (LTFASIB) #3, 1978’s You Don’t Bring Me Flowers #5, 1979’s No More Tears #3 & 1980’s Woman In Love #1 but other side of that, her singles have mainly gone pretty much unnoticed.

Michael: I wish, I'm 44 but very nearly 45, so I have been taking in music for the majority of her career. The first tracks/artists I remember taking in at the time, were from around late 1977/early 1978, things like Wings - Mull of Kintyre, Boney M, Queen, ABBA, Blondie, Kate Bush, Adam & The Ants. The first and I have to say probably the only song of Barbaras I was ever aware of, when it was contemporary, was Woman In Love in 1980. I've gone on to hear YDBMF in later years and know the song Memory very well but I know & like the Elaine Paige far more.

Yes, her last four album(2009) (2011)(2014)(2016) all top UK or sold over Platimun. And she also have no 1 album in 1982, 200 with two comilp, and IFFS and Tell him both among best duet seller of all time in UK during 90s. And she is the top 10 female since 1982 after her peak year. Best seller compilation proved her catalogue, and most of them as MJD refer to in the article without her biggest hit, timeless and evergreen, new big albums remaind us of her attraction and popularity nowadays.

Same here. I mean i know the name, but the only songs I ever heard from her were "Woman in Love" and that single with Celine (which name i can't even remember).
I also knew Memories, from the shower scene in Naked Gun 2, but i had no idea it was Barbra's song 😀

“Her last four albums in (2009), (2011), (2014) & (2016), all top UK or sold over Platinum”
Not quite, LITA (2009) & Encore: MPSB (2016) reached #1 on the UK album chart but What Matters Most (2011) reached #7 & Partners (2014) #2. They are also not all over Platinum, LITA is stated here at 145k, WMM at 50k & Encore at 58k, Partners is the only one listed over Platinum at 385k. None of them really hung around very long in the album chart either, with LITA only managing 10wks, WMM 5wks & Encore 7wks, Partners with 23wks is the only reasonably good performing album, when looking at chart stay.

Again though, I know she has been successful in the UK but I just do not think her catalogue is that well known or that recognisable to an average member of the UK public. The fact her more recent albums in the UK have all performed pretty well when looking at highest position, doesn’t really tell the full story, as regardless of all hitting the Top 10 & 2 going to #1, none of them with the slight exception of Partners seems to have sold that much out with her fan base or ingrained themselves in the general publics minds.

Wow!Impressive work!Her us album sales are nearly 90 million what a success!And the next one's Elvis i hope

As an actress, pop star, and all-around entertainer, Streisand is about the closest thing my generation has to Golden Era Hollywood. Please add another line to her achievements page; 11 US number one albums, another 7 in the UK.

The 2011 album isnt WMT but platinum cer The Ultimate Collection, if I remember right, her peers's last "hit" greastest hit album all near 20 years ago. Only Barbra still produce no. 1 album and good figure for compilations. The Partners is rather a best of than studio album. And other peer's new albums all floped or out of chart

Yes, she is the first female superstar and top actress after Golden Era Hollywood, she will ranked inside top 2 in New list of AFI Greatest Star .

Thank Anthony Blanchard for giving us the decades dates of Barbra's records:

60’s: 31,384,000 (#5)
70’s: 57,359,000 (#14)
80’s: 43,186,000 (#13)
90’s: 14,011,000 (#31)
00’s: about 5m
10’s: about 1m

CSPC:Biggest Divas of 60's,70's, Top 3 of 80's, top10 of 80s
Pure Album:Biggest Divas of 60's,70's, Top 2 of 80's, top8 of 80s
Physical Singles:Biggest Divas of 70's

The Ultimate Collection is a 2010 album not 2011 and although it did indeed go Platinum, it again did not reach #1 but #8. Strange thing about this album is, it supposedly has a release date of 29th March 2010 but didn't chart in the UK until 6th November 2010! The only album she actually released in 2011 was What Matters Most.

As for her peers (I take it you mean other female singers/Divas, as opposed to female singers or solo artists, that started out in the 1960's) being unsuccessful with GH's over the past 20 years, this is untrue. Celebration (2009) by Madonna, was more successful than Babs Ultimate Collection, reaching #1 in the UK & many other countries & shipping at least 2x's Platinum in the UK. Whitney Houstons The Ultimate Collection (2007) also performed better than Babs UC originally, reaching #3 in the UK and shipping at least 5x Platinum, although admittedly, her passing did boost it's sales.

OMG? How can Madonna and Whitney be Barbra's peers? They came over 20 years later. It's likely putting Taylor or Adele as Madonna's peers