Pop diva Celine Dion earns $100 mn, just behind Madonna and ahead of Beyonce

TORONTO - Canadian pop diva Celine Dion earned $100 million last year, just behind Madonna at $110 million, according to Forbes magazine. Beyonce Knowles was the third in the list of top earners in the music industry. Dion’s ‘Taking Chances Tour’ last year raked in $237 million. She also released an English-language greatest-hits collection, “My Love: Essential Collection,” and featured in advertisements for a new fragrance.

The 41-year-old Canadian idol has sold over 200 million albums worldwide.

Dion was elevated to Companion of the Order of Canada last year “for having won over audiences worldwide with her extraordinary talent as a pop singer, and for her commitment to numerous humanitarian causes at the national and international levels”.

The youngest of 14 siblings born into a poor family in Charlemagne near Montreal and not even a high school graduate, she was given an honorary doctorate in music by Laval University in Quebec City last year. The honour was bestowed on the diva to mark the 400th birthday celebrations of Quebec City - the oldest city in Canada and also the capital of Quebec province.

Known as the “little girl from Charlemagne”, she said: “If there is something that has guided my life, it’s my wish to excel and go farther, to the maximum of my abilities, to the top of my goals, my hopes and my dreams.”