The success of Mamma Mia! on both sides of the Atlantic (not to mention Down Under) has boosted sales of ABBA CDs.

In a nice twist to the usual direction of fame - film to stage, television to stage, pop stardom to stage, and so on - theatre, in the form of Mamma Mia!, has been helping the recording industry.

The success of the musical, in New York as well as London, California as well as Canada and Australia too, has revived interest in ABBA (whose songs of course feature in Mamma Mia!) and pushed up cd sales.

One of the best-selling recordings of the past decade, "ABBA Gold" is doing better than ever, reaching Number 10 in the American "Billboard Pop Catalog Chart."

This is certainly a case of what goes around comes around - Mamma Mia! works on its own terms as a narrative story, but was in essence created as a vehicle for ABBA's songs, in the hope that their longstanding popularity would entice large numbers of ABBA fans into the theatre. This hope has proved well-founded.

The London production, at the Prince Edward, continues to sell as well (two and a half years after opening) now as it did in the first flush of its success, rivalled only by My Fair Lady and The Lion King. As the saying goes, it doesn't get much fabber than ABA.