Kaliopi

Kaliopi Bukle (Калиопи Букле, ; born 28 December 1966), known professionally as Kaliopi, is a Macedonian singer-songwriter.

In 1976, she entered a Macedonian children's festival called "Zlatno Slavejče", which she won with the song "Mojata učitelka".

She later toured with the choir of Zapro Zaprov "Razvigorče", performing in Czechoslovakia, Slovenia (then within Yugoslavia) and Austria between 1978 and 1980.

In her career, Kaliopi has progressed from singing lead vocal with her eponymous band in 1980s Yugoslavia to being an established vocalist and composer working in North Macedonia and across former Yugoslavia.

She then joined the class of Marija Nikolovska, where she studied solo singing for four years, before continuing her training at the Music Academy in the class of Blagoja Nikolovski in 1984.

Kaliopi competed in the 1984 Yugoslavian solo singing contest, finishing in third place and competing as the youngest classical music singer at the festival.

In 1984, Kaliopi founded the band "Kaliopi" with Romeo Grill, recording their first two songs, "Tomi" and "Nemoj da me budis" at the request of Macedonian Radio.

The band won best interpretation for the song "Leo" at the Festival Opatija, an award voted for by the journalists of Yugoslavia.

In 1986, the band released their eponymous debut album on the ZKP RTLJ record label.

In the same year, they participated in the Split Festival, where they won the best debut performer award for their song "Da more zna".

In 1987, the band released their second album, "Rodjeni", which was recorded in Zagreb and was highly successful, producing the hit song "Rodjeni (Bato)" created by the author Romeo Grill.

The band was active in the music scene, performing at festivals, recording television specials for TV Zagreb, TV Belgrade, TV Sarajevo and TV Titograd and performing a concert tour that included performances in the Soviet Union.

At the height of the band's popularity, Kaliopi and Romeo Grill moved to Switzerland.

After an extended absence from the music scene, followed by the breakup of Yugoslavia, the band was officially dissolved.

Kaliopi returned to the music scene as a solo performer in the Republic of Macedonia and competed at the 1996 edition of Skopje Fest, the national selection for the Eurovision Song Contest 1996.

With the song "Samo ti", she was awarded first place by the jury and the audience, winning the right to be the first representative for Macedonia at the Eurovision Song Contest.

However, the 1996 Contest saw an influx of new participants and at a non-televised audio pre-selection, Macedonia was eliminated from the Contest.

Kaliopi later competed in Skopje Fest 1998, but only managed ninth place with the song "Ne zaboravaj".

Kaliopi began re-establishing herself in the music scene of Macedonia, composing songs for other artists and releasing her solo debut album, "Oboi me" in December 1999.

The album was promoted via a television special broadcast on MRT, single releases for the songs "Oboi me" and "Daj da pijam" and a promotional tour in summer 2000.

In 2000, Kaliopi established her own record label Kaliopi Music Production, which exclusively dealt with her releases in Macedonia.

In January 2001, Kaliopi announced the release of a new album and a new collaboration with producer Darko Dimitrov.

The album's title track "Ako denot mi e nokj" was the first single release; this was followed by the release of "Na pat do Makedonija", "Dali me sakas", "Mesecina" and "Za samo eden den".

The album was promoted through a television documentary titled "Kaliopi Again" on MRT, an unplugged concert at the ancient Heraclea Lyncestis amphitheatre in Bitola and the "Na pat do Makedonija" concert tour, which commenced in November 2001 and included eleven concert dates across Macedonia.

On 16 February 2002, Kaliopi took part in Skopje Fest 2002 as a composer and a backing vocalist for the song "Pesna za nas", which was performed by Gorgi Krstevski.

The song placed fifth in the competition.

In July 2002, Kaliopi released the single "Najmila", which was one of two new songs featured on the October release of the live album "Najmila: Kaliopi Live and Unreleased".

Kaliopi released "Zasluzena Zemja" as the follow-up single from the album.

In 2003, Kaliopi released the title track from her third album, "Ne mi go zemaj vremeto", as the first single.

The album was released in December 2003 and featured the duets "Bel den" with Macedonian Romani singer Esma Redžepova and "Purpurni dozdovi" with Macedonian actor Vasil Zafirchev.

The album produced the radio hits "Za kogo postojam", "Toa sum jas", "Dari dari dam" and "Koga prokleto ti trebam" during 2004 and 2005.

This was also the first solo album to feature songs in the Serbo-Croatian language and it also included Kaliopi's first single aimed at the ex-Yugoslavian market titled "Smeh".

In 2004, Kaliopi played the lead in the first Macedonian musical, titled "Cija si".

In November 2004, along with five other artists, Kaliopi was selected for the Macedonia pre-selection for the Eurovision Song Contest 2005.

She opted out of the selection in the initial stages after learning that the process would be competition based rather than an internal selection.

However, she still remained part of the competition as a composer, supplying selection finalist Aleksandra Pileva with the song "Ne", which ultimately placed third.

She represented Macedonia twice in the Eurovision Song Contest, first in 2012 in Baku, Azerbaijan with "Crno i belo" and a second time in 2016 in Stockholm, Sweden with the song "Dona".

Kaliopi was born into a mixed Aromanian–Macedonian family in Ohrid and raised up in Kičevo.

She showed interest in music at a young age.

The album was the last collaboration with her former bandmate Romeo Grill until 2012.