David Bowie has been cremated in a secret ceremony in New York, without any friends or family present, according to reports from the United States.

The pop music icon, who passed away on Sunday at the age of 69 having kept his 18 month long battle with cancer a secret from the world, apparently told his loved ones that he wanted to “go without any fuss” and did not want a funeral service or public memorial.

“There is no public or private service or a public memorial. There is nothing,” a close friend of the family told The Mirror on Wednesday (January 13th), saying that the cremation had already happened.

David BowieDavid Bowie's star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame has been turned into an impromptu shrine

Another source said: “In many respects you don’t need a memorial or service to remember David by – you have his music instead. He would have wanted to just disappear with no fuss, no big show, no fanfare. This would totally be his style.”

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Bowie had lived in New York since 1994 with his second wife, Iman, and their daughter Alexandria, now 15. The Telegraph speculates that Bowie may have opted for what is referred to as a “direct cremation”, described on the New York State’s health department website as “the disposition of human remains by cremation without a formal viewing, visitation, or ceremony.”

Bowie’s death shocked many, with the revelation that he had told very few people about his illness. Tributes have been pouring in from around the world, and his newly-released album Blackstar is set to enter the charts at Number 1 on both sides of the Atlantic.

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Robert Fox, a friend of the Bowie family, said that he had visited the singer last month and found him in a positive mood despite his condition. “He was feeling unwell but he wasn’t making a fuss about it," he said.

“He was about to start a new treatment that was quite experimental and that had had some success in other people. He felt optimistic about it being able to prolong his life, hopefully in the belief that there would be better and newer treatments that would come along.”

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