For the second best vocal performance of all time, as voted by a 2012 Rolling Stone Reader's Poll, the performer received a standard (at the time) £30 fee. The song is on a 1973 album that appears in the top 50 in Rolling Stones' Greatest 500 Albums list. Who was the performer?

Pink Floyd had been tinkering with "The Great Gig in the Sky" for a long time before they finally brought in a female vocalist to sing over what they originally conceived as an instrumental. "I went in, put the headphones on, and started going 'Ooh-aah, baby, baby - yeah, yeah, yeah,'" recalled singer Clare Torry. "They said, 'No, no - we don't want that. If we wanted that, we'd have got Doris Troy.' They said, 'Try some longer notes,' so I started doing that a bit." Over just three takes, Torry wailed over Richard Wright's piano work, pretending her voice was an instrument. The group was thrilled with the results, even though Torry wasn't so sure she did a good job. In 2004, she sued the band, claiming she should have a cowriting credit on the song. They settled the suit, and all pressings of the album now list Wright/Torry as the songwriters.