Barbra Streisand’s Career
This is a review of Barbra Streisand greatest hits and her career as a successful singer-songwriter, actress, author, writer, film producer, and director. According to Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), he has sold over 71.5 million albums in the United State and 145 million records worldwide, and she is the best-selling female artist on the RIAA Top Selling Album Artists list.
She was born Barbara Joan Streisand on April 24, 1942 in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, New York, the daughter of Diana and Emanuel Streisand. She changed her name to Barbra Joan Streisand when she was eighteen years old because she hated the name. She dropped the “a” from Barbara to be unique.
Early Life
When Barbra was fifteen months old her father died of complications from an epileptic seizure and the family fell into near-poverty. She has an older brother “Sheldon” and a half-sister, the singer “Roslyn Kind”. Barbra went to the Jewish Orthodox Yeshiva of Brooklyn, giving solo performance at the age of seven. She attended the Erasmus Hall High School in Brooklyn and joined the Freshman Chorus and Choral Club.
Barbra Streisand became a nightclub singer while in her teens. She wanted to be an actress so bad that she appeared in “Summer Stock” and in a number of Off-Off Broadway productions. Her boyfriend, “Barry Dennen”, helped her create a club act – first performed at The Lion, a popular gay nightclub in Manhattan’s Greenwich Village in 1960 – and she achieved success as a singer.
Singing Career
Streisand returned to Broadway in 1964 with an acclaimed performance as entertainer “Fanny Brice” in “Funny Girl” at the “Winter Garden Theatre.” The show introduced two of her signature songs, “People” and “Don’t Rain on My Parade.” The song “People” was her first top ten hit on Billboard’s Hot 100 chart topping out at number 5, in 1964, and stayed on the charts for 19 weeks. This was her break through hit of her career. Her next top ten hit was six years later with a song “Stoney End” in 1970 and reached #6.
Barbra’s first number one hit was “The Way We Were” in 1973. It stayed on top the charts for three weeks. Three years later she followed with her second #1 hit “Evergreen” in 1976. It also stayed on top of the charts for three weeks. Her next number 1 song was “You Don’t Bring Me Flowers” in 1978, and stayed on top of the charts for two weeks. Her fourth number 1 hit was “No More tears (Enough Is Enough)” in 1979, and stayed on top of the charts for two weeks.
Barbra’s last number 1 hit and fifth was “Woman In Love” released in 1980, and stayed at #1 for 3 weeks. Her last top ten hit was “I Finally Found Someone” in 1996, at #8, and was on the charts for 20 weeks. Her last single to chart on the Hot 100 Chart was “Tell Him” in 1997 at #58.
All told Barbra Streisand had a total of 5 #1 Hits, 12 Top 10, 13 Top 20, 21 Top 40, and 30 Top 10 albums in her career on the pop charts. She had a total of eight number one hits on the Adult Contemporary Charts from 1964-2001. She had a total of 63 songs that charted on the Adult Contemporary Chart and 48 songs on the Hot 100 Chart with four of those reaching the “Bubbling Under” chart.
Awards
Barbra Streisand has won two Academy Awards, fifteen Grammy Awards, five Emmy Awards including one Daytime Emmy, a Special Tony Award, an American Film Institute award, a Kennedy Center Honors award, a Peabody Award, and is one of the few entertainers who have won an Oscar, Emmy, Grammy, and Tony Award in their lifetime. She received the Legend Award in 1992, and the Lifetime Achievement in 1995.
According to the RIAA, Streisand holds the record for the most top-ten albums of any female recording artist – a total of 32 since 1963. Streisand has the widest span (48 years) between first and latest top-ten albums of any female recording artist. With her 2009 album, “Love Is the Answer”, she became one of the rare artists to achieve number-one albums in five consecutive decades. According to the RIAA, she has released 51 Gold albums, 30 Platinum albums, and 13 Multi-Platinum albums in the United States.
Billboard has ranked Barbra Streisand as the #27 artist from 1970-1979, and the #46 artist of all-time from 1955-2010. Billboard also ranks Barbra as the #2 artist of all-time on the Adult Contemporary chart from 1961-2001.
Number One & Top Ten Hits
Below is a complete listing of all of Barbra’s number one and top ten hits on both the Hot 100 and Adult Contemporary charts. The list will consist of the Title, Date, Weeks at #1, #2, #3 in (), with #1 songs in bold.
Hot 100 Chart
- People – April 4, 1964 #5
- Stoney End – October 31, 1970 #6
- The Way We Were – February 2, 1974 (3)
- Evergreen – March 5, 1977 (3)
- My Heart Belongs To Me – May 21, 1977 #4
- You Don’t Bring Me Flowers – December 2, 1978 (2)
- The Main Event/Fight – June 16, 1979 #3 (4)
- No More Tears (Enough Is Enough) – November 24, 1979 (2)
- Woman In Love – October 25, 1980 (3)
- Guilty – November 1, 1980 #3 (2)
- What Kind Of Fool – January 31, 1981 #10
- I Finally Found Someone – November 23, 1996 #8
Adult Contemporary Chart
- People – June 27, 1964 (3)
- Funny Girl – September 19, 1964 #6
- He Touched Me – September 25, 1965 #2 (1)
- Second Hand Rose – December 18, 1965 #5
- Where Am I Going? – February 5, 1966 #4
- Sam, You Made The Paints Too Long – May 14, 1966 #9
- Free Again – September 24, 1966 #8
- Stout-Hearted Men – August 5, 1967 #2 (2)
- Stoney End – October 24, 1970 #2 (1)
- Time And Love – March 20, 1971 #3 (1)
- Flim Flam Man – May 22, 1971 #7
- Where You Lead – July 24, 1971 #3 (1)
- The Way We Were – January 12, 1974 (2)
- All In Love Is Fair – March 30, 1974 #10
- Love Theme From “A Star Is Born” (Evergreen) – January 15, 1977 (6)
- My Heart Belongs To Me – July 30, 1977 (4)
- Songbird – July 29, 1978 (2)
- You Don’t Bring Me Flowers – October 28, 1978 #3 (1)
- The Main Event/Fight – June 23, 1979 #2 (1)
- No More Tears – October 27, 1979 #7
- Kiss Me In The Rain – January 5, 1980 #9
- Woman In Love – October 11, 1980 (5)
- Guilty – November 1, 1980 #5
- What Kind Of Fool – March 14, 1981 (4)
- Promises – May 16, 1981 #8
- Comin’ In And Out Of Your Life – November 14, 1981 #2 (6)
- Memory – February 27, 1982 #9
- The Way He Makes Me Feel – December 10, 1983 (2)
- Left In The Dark – September 15, 1984 #4
- Make No Mistake, He’s Mine – December 15, 1984 #8
- Somewhere – November 30, 1985 #5
- Till I Loved You – October 22, 1988 #3 (1)
- We’re Not Makin’ Love Anymore – September 30, 1989 #10
- I Finally Found Someone – November 11, 1996 #2 (2)
- Tell Him – October 25, 1997 #5
Film Career
Besides her wonderful singing career, she also had a successful film career as well. She performed in the following films in order of their release and her role in ():
- Funny Girl – 1968 (Fanny Brice)
- Hello Dolly! – 1969 (Dolly Levi)
- On A Clear Day You Can See Forever – 1970 (Daisy Gamble / Melinda Tentres)
- The Owl And The Pussycat – 1970 (Doris Wilgus, Wadsworth, Wellington, Waverly)
- What’s Up Doc? – 1972 (Judy Maxwell)
- Up The Sandbox – 1972 (Margaret Reynolds)
- The Way We Were – 1973 (Katie Morosky)
- For Pete’s Sake – 1974 (Henrietta “Henry” Robbins)
- Funny Lady – 1975 (Fanny Brice)
- A Star Is Born – 1976 (Esther Hoffman Howard)
- The Main Event – 1979 (Hillary Kramer)
- All Night Long – 1981 (Cheryl Gibbons)
- Yentl – 1983 (Yentl / Anshel)
- Nuts – 1987 (Claudia Faith Draper)
- The Prince of Tides – 1991 (Dr. Susan Lowenstein)
- The Mirror Has Two Faces – 1996 (Rose Morgan)
- Meet The Fockers – 2004 (Roz Focker)
- Little Fockers – 2010 (Roz Focker)
- The Guilt Trip – 2012 (Joyce Brewster)
She won an Oscar for Best Actress in “Funny Girl” and one for songwriting with “Evergreen.” In total, she was nominated for five Oscars and won two.
If you are a big fan of Barbra Streisand I recommend the album below as it contains all of of her Hot 100 and Adult Contemporary Charted #1’s and many of her top ten hits with The Essential Barbra Streisand. This album that contains 40 tracks and is also available in MP3 format.
Shop Barbra Streisand Greatest Hits
As an Amazon associate I earn from qualified purchases.
You can shop for individual Barbra Streisand Greatest Hits by clicking on the link. You will be taken to Amazon Try Prime Digital Music where you can download any of Barbra’s individual hits missing from your collection for a small fee.
Go back to the top 100 songs of all time home page.