Kalomira

Maria Kalomira Sarantis (born January 31, 1985), known professionally as Kalomira (sometimes transliterated as Kalomoira), is a Greek-American singer.

Kalomira was born Maria Kalomira Sarantis on January 31, 1985, in West Hempstead, New York on Long Island.

Known to her immediate family as Carol (her childhood nickname), her parents are Greek restaurant owners Nikos and Eleni Sarantis.

Since childhood, she had the ambition to become a pop star.

She played the viola, which she studied for nine years and played in the school orchestra.

She was also Miss West Hempstead (Homecoming Queen) at her high school in 2003.

In 2003, she entered and won second place at a music contest organized by WBLI Radio.

Following her appearance, she opened up several live shows with famous American artists, such as Jessica Simpson, LL Cool J, Jennifer Love Hewitt, Michelle Branch and Nick Lachey.

Kalomira entered the New York City auditions for Antenna's reality singing competition Fame Story 2, which was a licensed variant of the Star Academy franchise.

She was one of two selected from over 200 auditions in New York.

Despite speaking primarily English, and not speaking Greek fluently, Kalomira went to Greece after having completed one semester of college at Adelphi University where she was a music major with a scholarship.

Kalomira placed first and her professional singing career began.

Kalomira won the contest, earned 200,000 Euros and a recording contract with Heaven Music.

The audience of the show loved her from the first time and they created the slogan "Irthes kai mas allakses ti moira, Kalomoira-Kalomoira" (You came and changed our destiny, Kalomira-Kalomira).

Kalomira performed in Thessaloniki’s FOCUS from July 8 to August 14.

While entertaining audiences by night, she was recording her first album by day.

Born and raised on Long Island, just outside of New York City in the United States, she first came to prominence in Greece in 2004, after winning the Greek talent show Fame Story.

Outside of Greece, Kalomira has appeared on NBC’s "Today Show" and "Access Hollywood" during the events of the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, UPN's Greek Parade where she sang live and was interviewed, Fox News, was in the "Washington Post", "Newsday" and "New York Times" and most currently featured on Oprah for her Eurovision Performance, along with a number of other shows and websites.

On September 1, 2004, Kalomira released her 15-track debut album Kalomira, which went gold in Greece and Cyprus.

Her lead single, "Nomizeis", became an instant hit and topping the charts in Greece.

Next singles from the album was the songs "Ego eimai i Kalomira", "Pethaino Gia Sena", "Proti Mou Fora" and the christmas "Kai Tou Hronou".

She then toured Greece accompanied by the rest of the "Fame Story" participants with appearances in Athens's "Thalassa".

In the same year, she closed her season at the REX studio with Despina Vandi and Thanos Petrelis.

Kalomira received good reviews from critics and was awarded "Woman of the Year – Best Newcomer" by Life and Style magazine.

Also in 2004, she had a minor credited role in the longest-running Greek TV drama series Lampsi, playing the part of Jennifer Drakou for 30 episodes, where veteran director Nikos Foskolos compared her to Aliki Vougiouklaki.

Also, Kalomira performed twice in Herodium theatre like a surprise cake for Dionysis Savvopoulos's birthday and she sang Marilyn Monroe's song, "Happy Birthday Mr. President".

In 2005, Kalomira released her second album titled Paizeis? (You Playing?) with 12 songs, of which two were written and composed by her.

"Paizeis" and "Ki Olo Perimeno" were the two singles from the album that stood out with great success.

She also agreed to appear with Elli Kokkinou, Andreas Stamos and Constantinos Christoforou at the Piraeus 130 music club.

In her program, she included covers of songs such as "Scandalous," "Don't Cha" and "Don't Phunk with My Heart," in addition to songs from her first and second albums.

On April 11, 2005, she was a special guest on the first live concert of the first season of Star Academy Bulgaria.

For three months she had the role of co-hostess next to Eleonora Meleti on the show Proinos Cafes (Morning Coffee).

In the fall of 2006, Kalomira became the female co-hostess on the hit Sunday night show Pio Poli Tin Kiriaki (Even More on Sunday) alongside Grigoris Arnaoutoglou on Mega Channel.

In December, she released her third studio album I Kalomira Paei Cinema (Kalomira Goes to the Cinema).

It's a concept album with the most popular classic songs from the old Greek Cinema.

At that time they appeared with Nikos Makropoulos, Aggeliki Iliadi and Sarbel at the Fever nightclub.

At the end of 2007, Heaven Music chose Kalomira to be their contestant in the 2008 National Final to represent Greece in the Eurovision Song Contest 2008.

Kalomira picked an R&B style upbeat song with a Greek feel composed by Konstantinos Pantzis with lyrics by Poseidonas Giannopoulos titled "Secret Combination".

The song has an "American production" feel to it.

She has subsequently released four studio albums, represented Greece in the Eurovision Song Contest 2008, and hosted various television shows.