THE song Danny Boy was performed as friends and relatives said a final goodbye to Tommy Ball.

A funeral for the Blackburn shoe magnate took place on the Isle of Man yesterday afternoon, followed by a committal at a nearby crematorium.

Mr Ball died last month, aged 83. He had been living on the Isle of Man for 20 years since selling his nationally-renowned Tommy Ball's shoe store in 1986.

About 40 people attended the 25-minute funeral service in Maughold Anglican Church, which was attended by Mr Ball's son, also called Tommy.

The congregation joined in with two hymns, Praise My Soul the King of Heaven and The Day Thou Gave Me, Lord, is Over.

Canon David Green gave a short summary of the life of Mr Ball, and the Enya song Marble Halls was played as the procession left the church.

Later that afternoon Boy From Nowhere, a song made famous by Tom Jones, was played as self-made shoe king's close friends and family filed into a committal service at nearby Douglas Borough Crematorium.

Finally Danny Boy, sung by a chorister, brought the ceremony to a close.

Funeral director Phil Faragher, of Isle of Man-based Corkhill and Callow, said: "It was a very moving moment and the whole ceremony went very well."

Tributes poured in for Mr Ball after he died on Sunday March 30.

Blackburn MP Jack Straw called him a "great, iconic, home-grown Blackburn figure" while David Cottam, president of Blackburn and District Chamber of Trade, said he ahd but the town on the map.

In the 1940s, Tommy started as a rag-and-bone man selling everything from secondhand clothing to shoes.

He set up his shoe business in the 1950s and soon people were travelling by the coachload from Edinburgh, Glasgow, Newcastle, Manchester, Yorkshire and Wakefield Mr Ball also mounted a high-profile campaign against the council's Sunday trading laws.

He set up a Sunday club, charging people 5p to enter the shop, in order to get round the trading laws.

The money was then donated to charity.