Selena’s ‘Dreaming’ Album Premieres in No. 1 Spot

Selena’s dream of crossing over strongly from Latin-music stardom to the U.S. pop charts was realized last week when her posthumous “Dreaming of You” became the nation’s best-selling album in its first week in the stores, SoundScan reported Wednesday.

By selling 331,000 copies, the collection not only became the biggest first-week seller by a female artist since SoundScan began monitoring U.S. sales in 1992, but also became the first album by a Latin artist to debut at No. 1, according to EMI Records. The label estimates that actual sales topped 400,000 because many copies were sold at small stores that aren’t tracked by SoundScan.

“We’re very happy and excited, but I obviously wish my daughter was here to share this with us--she’d be thrilled,” Selena’s father, Abraham Quintanilla, said Wednesday. “English was her first language. I always knew she could succeed in this market.”

Selena’s record company, EMI Records, was also thrilled with the success of “Dreaming of You,” a 13-song collection containing four new English songs as well as several of her best-known Spanish hits from previous albums.

“This is what the dream was about in 1989,” said EMI Latin president Jose Behar, who signed Selena that year. “Seeing it all come to fruition is tremendous.”

The 23-year-old tejano music star from Corpus Christi, Tex., was shot to death March 31 by a business associate, police said.

Her album was one of two hot debuts last week. The other--Jodeci’s “The Show, the After Party, the Hotel”--sold an estimated 197,000 copies to gain the No. 2 spot on the charts.

Michael Jackson’s “HIStory--Past, Present and Future Book 1” continued to slip down the charts, coming in at No. 8 with 83,000 sold--more than 20,000 fewer than last week.