Canadian singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen is now a triple threat on British charts.

His 1986 song Hallelujah is No. 1, No. 2 and No. 36 on the U.K.'s Christmas Top 40 chart, which came out on Sunday.

The melancholy bard's own version of the song, a sad lament for love larded with Biblical references, is way down the charts at No. 36.

But it was powered to that position by the decision of reality TV show X Factor to have its three finalists record Hallelujah and perform it in the finale 10 days ago.

When Alexandra Burke won, her single recording of the song stormed up the charts, selling 576,000 copies last week.

Fans of the late American singer Jeff Buckley were incensed at the idea that a reality TV show star would have a hit with Hallelujah. They consider Buckley's 1994 Hallelujah the definitive version. Buckley died in 1997.

Fans mounted a campaign to push Buckley's version up the charts. It sold 81,000 downloads and finished the week at No. 2.

Cohen, 74, benefited from the renewed interest in his song and his own version was propelled onto the charts by a new generation of fans interested in its far from festive sentiments.

The top-selling single for Christmas week is closely watched in Britain, with music promoters timing their releases in a hope to cash in on the buying frenzy.

Past winners of the Christmas No. 1 include Band Aid's 1984 Do They Know It's Christmas, Al Martino's Here in My Heart in 1952 and the Spice Girls' 2 Become 1 in 1996.