Sertab Erener (born 4 December 1964) is a Turkish singer, songwriter and composer. With her coloratura soprano voice, she started working as a backing vocalist for Sezen Aksu, and with Aksu's help she released her first studio album in the 1990s. Because of her education in classical music, she initially had difficulties in performing pop music. Although she did experimental works from time to time, she eventually preferred to focus on making pop music instead of avant-garde works, in order to make her music heard by a larger audience. In some of her works, she combined Western music and Eastern music, and benefited from as well as classical Turkish music with ethnic elements. With her entrance to Europe's market in the early 2000s, many of her works were also sold in Turkey as well as European countries.
With Sezen Aksu's help, she made her debut in 1992 with the album Sakin Ol!, and made herself known as a Turkish pop music artist in the 1990s by releasing the albums Lâ'l (1994), Sertab Gibi (1997) and Sertab Erener (1999). From these albums, the songs "Sakin Ol!", "Aldırma Deli Gönlüm", "Ateşle Barut", "Sevdam Ağlıyor", "Aslolan Aşktır", "Yanarım", "Zor Kadın" and "Vur Yüreğim" became number-one hits in Turkey. In the early 2000s, she continued her work by releasing the songs "Kumsalda" and "Kendime Yeni Bir Ben Lazım". She won the Eurovision Song Contest 2003 with the song "Everyway That I Can", marking Turkey's first victory in the competition. In 2004, she released the album No Boundaries, followed by Aşk Ölmez in 2005. After five years, she released another Turkish studio album Rengârenk in 2010, and the hit songs "Bu Böyle", "Açık Adres" and "Koparılan Çiçekler" made the album a successful work, and marked her return to the music market. After Rengârenk, she released the album Ey Şuh-i Sertab (2012), which was dedicated to her father. At the same year, she received the Best Female TSM Soloist award at the Golden Butterfly Awards. In 2013, her new album Sade was released. The songs "İyileşiyorum", "Öyle de Güzel" and "Söz" all became hits in Turkey. In 2016, with the release of Kırık Kalpler Albümü, Erener stated that she was returning to her 90s style. The album received favorable reviews, and "Kime Diyorum" and "Olsun" both became hit songs in Turkey.
Erener has been praised for her music style and is one of the most successful artists who were discovered by Sezen Aksu. Due to her championship in Eurovision, she received the State Medal of Distinguished Service. In 2014, Hürriyet named her in its list of "91 Symbols of the 91st Anniversary of the Republic". Aside from her career as a singer, she also taught music at Müjdat Gezen Art Center for one year. Erener has been married three times, the second of which was to Levent Yüksel during 1990–96. She married Emre Kula in 2015. Throughout her career she has won seven Kral TV Video Music Awards as well as two Golden Butterfly Awards, and has received various other nominations.
Sertab joined Sezen Aksu's birthday party in 1987 at Memduh Paşa Mansion as a soloist. She was chosen by the organizer of the party to perform at the event. Sezen Aksu noted Erener's drabness during their first meeting, but she liked her voice and offered her a job as a backing vocalist. Erener initially did not want to accept the offer and later said: "She Sezen asked me to become her backing vocalist. I didn't accept it. Because I was already a soloist. It sounded like taking a step backwards. I thought I shouldn't be a vocalist because of my position." Later, due to her friend Levent Yüksel's closeness with Aksu, Erener accepted the offer and became her backing vocalist. She later participated in the 1987 Kuşadası Golden Pigeon Music Competition under her married name, Sertab Altın, and performed the song "Akdeniz". In 1989, she joined Klips ve Onlar and performed the song "Hasret" in the competition to represent Turkey in the Eurovision Song Contest 1989. They were placed third and lost the chance to represent the country in the contest. In 1990, she again joined the first-stage competitions, performed the song "Sen Benimlesin" and ranked 6th. In the same year, she married Levent Yüksel. She later described her second marriage in an interview: "Levent was one of my close friends; we were pals. He had girlfriends, I had boyfriends. We worked in the same orchestra. After divorce, I didn't even realize how it happened, I can't explain it, but it was a kind of affection or something like that. I had a lot of friends, but Levent was always special to me, and had a separate place. I think I was feeling something special about him. It happened spontaneously without even pushing."
On 13 March 1993, she gave a concert during the national selection in Turkey to choose the artist for the Eurovision Song Contest 1993. In June, Hey Girl magazine named her the Promising Singer of the Year. In July, she performed at Rumelihisarı. In 1993 and 1994, she went to the US and underwent three surgeries for ulcerative colitis from which she had been suffering since the age of 11.Reports on Sertab Erener's surgeries:
In between her surgeries Erener began preparations for her second studio album Lâ'l, which was released on 14 October 1994. Most of the songs in the album were written by Sezen Aksu and it sold 640,000 copies. The album's lead single was prepared for the documentary 12 Mart: İhtilalin Pençesinde Demokrasi and dedicated to Deniz Gezmiş. It was later included in Sony Music's Sony Music 100 Years: Soundtrack for a Century millennium set. Sertab Erener shot music videos for the songs "Sevdam Ağlıyor" and "Rüya" from this album. Sezen Aksu wrote the song "Rüya", inspired by Erener's illness and the sufferings that she endured following her surgeries. To promote Lâ'l, Erener gave a concert at the Bostancı Show Center, during which she performed "Der Hölle Rache" from Mozart's The Magic Flute. Later, she said that she wanted to turn opera into a popular genre among the people. In March 1995, she won the Best Female Artist award at the 1st Kral TV Video Music Awards. In April, she performed at the Miss Turkey competition. In September, she joined the campaign "We Go To the East with 1000 Artists", which was organized by Ministry of Culture and Tourism, and gave concerts in Eastern parts of Turkey.
In 1996, Kim magazine ranked Erener 6th on its list of the Frumpish Dressed Women. On 18 June 1996, Erener and her husband Levent Yüksel divorced. The couple later said that the reason behind their divorce was that "Our 13-year love turned into sibling or parental feelings. We decided to obtain a divorce because we thought that marriage wouldn't work out without love." In the same year, Erener voiced the character of Esmeralda in the Turkish version of The Hunchback of Notre Dame. She also started working with Mezarkabul's guitarist Demir Demirkan. At the end of the year, preparations for her third studio album began. For the first time, she included songs that were written by herself in the album. She later talked about how she started songwriting: "I've tried to tell you what I live and feel as well as I can. Even if I didn't write it myself, I gave it to other songwriters to turn it into lyrics. I just acted as a commentator in my previous albums. This time, I work as a composer and songwriter." For her third studio album Erener signed a $100,000 contract with Sony Music and released Sertab Gibi in February 1997 under the labels of İmaj and Sony. Demir Demirkan also worked on the album. Hürriyets Lale Barçın İmer wrote that with Sertab Gibi Erener had taken an important step in her career. The songs "Aslolan Aşktır", "Seyrüsefer", "İncelikler Yüzünden", "Aaa" and "Yara" were turned into music videos and Sertab Gibi sold 147,000 copies by August 1997.
Sertab Erener later joined the campaign "Come on Southeast", and gave a concert on 26 August 1996 as a part of "Southeast Education Mobilization Concerts". In the same month, it was reported that Melih Ayraçman of Sony Music Turkey was planning on introducing Sertab Erener to the European audience with new projects. In December, Erener assisted Our Children with Leukemia Foundation and joined José Carreras in performing at a fundraising concert for the foundation. Alongside her own music projects, she taught music at the Müjdat Gezen Art Center for one year.
In May 2001, Erener's fifth studio album Turuncu was released. She later talked about her name choice for the album: "Turuncu Orange represents positive energy besides being a color. My album also carries a cheerful, warm, positive energy. I made this album trying to link people to life. Because I had major health problems, even in times of sadness, I always preferred to stay positive." The album ranked number-one on D&R's List of Best-Selling Albums and sold 260,000 copies. The songs "Kumsalda" and "Söz Bitti" from Turuncu were later turned into music videos. In December, Erener won the Best Turkish Pop Music Female Soloist award at the Golden Butterfly Awards, and her new single "Kendime Yeni Bir Ben Lazım" was published.
In January 2003, TRT announced that Erener would represent Turkey at the Eurovision Song Contest 2003. In February the name of the song was announced as "Everyway That I Can" and it was stated that the lyrics were in English. Turkish Language Association called for using a Turkish song instead to properly represent Turkish culture. Erener responded to the criticism by saying: "It has to be in English to comply with world standards. Half of the world listens to English music, why should they not listen to a Turkish artist who sings in English? ... People do not understand Turkish. If we find it difficult to in our own language, why should we? When TRT asked me to write a song, I gave them my conditions. I said, 'I want to sing the song in English'." The song was released on 8 March, and on 24 May in Riga, it earned 167 points earning Turkey its first victory in the contest and making it the host for the 2004 competition. "Everyway That I Can" entered the music charts of many European countries. In Sweden and Greece, it topped the official lists. Due to the song's commercial success in these two countries, it received a gold and platinum certification from the two of them respectively.
After returning to Turkey, Erener received various awards due to her victory in Eurovision. She met with President Ahmet Necdet Sezer and Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and a reception was organized to celebrate her victory. She was also given the State Medal of Distinguished Service. She also received two Honorary Awards at the 1st MÜ-YAP Music Awards and 10th Kral TV Video Music Awards. She later performed Bob Dylan's song "One More Cup of Coffee" for the film Masked and Anonymous which was released in July 2003. In August, she played in one of the films prepared by UNICEF and Ministry of National Education for the campaign "Come On Girls! Let's Go To School". Sertab was re-released in Europe with new additions and sold 500,000 copies as of August 2003. On 26 September, she performed with a number of artists at the Royal Albert Hall in a fundraising event to help Iraqi children with leukemia.
In January 2004, Erener's first English studio album No Boundaries was released in Europe. The album ranked number-one on Turkey's List of Best-Selling Albums, and was followed by the singles "Here I Am", "Leave" and "I Believe (That I See Love in You)". Out of these songs, "Here I Am" was used in the teasers for the movie A Tale of Two Sisters. In March, Erener's house was robbed and 15,000 of her properties were stolen. On 15 May, she opened the Eurovision Song Contest 2004 by performing the songs "Everyway That I Can" and "Leave". Despite the debate over the format of the ceremony, Erener used sama dancers for her performance. In the same year, due to the emergence of problems "in terms of singer-company relationship", she ended her contract with Sony Music and together with Demir Demirkan found the label Simya Müzik.
In May 2006, Sertab Erener's outfit for Eurovision was sold at an auction for 4,500. The proceeds were donated to the campaign "Daddy Take Me To School". In the same month, Erener performed the song "Çocuklar Gibi" for Ali Kocatepe's tribute album 41 Kere Maşallah. In June, she won the Best Pop Artist award at the Kemal Sunal Culture and Arts Awards. Later that month she went on stage at the 4th International Turkish Olympics and performed "Güneş Gibi Doğuyor Türkçe". In December, Erener went to Azerbaijan to perform at a concert, but pianist Burak Bedikyan from the orchestra, who was a Turkish citizen of Armenian descent, was kept in the airport and eventually deported to Turkey, urging Turkey to send a warning note to Azerbaijan.
In January 2007, it was announced that Erener would perform at a jazz concert on 1 February 2007, but the event was cancelled as she fell ill with pneumonia. She performed at the next concert on 18 February together with Sabri Tuluğ Tırpan Later they voiced the song "Sen Ağlama" for Onno Tunç's tribute album Onno Tunç Şarkıları, which was released in May. Onno Tunç Şarkıları (album booklet). Various Artists. Kolaj Müzik. 2007. 8694999015026. In April, she released the album The Best of Sertab Erener - En İyiler, which contained her greatest hits. Alongside her own songs, Isolina Carrillo's "Dos Gardenias" which she performed for the movie When Luck Breaks the Door (2005) and Madonna's "Music" which she performed for the documentary (2005) were also included in the album. The Best of Sertab Erener - En İyiler (album booklet). Sertab Erener. Columbia Records. 2007. 88697089492. In May, her first remix album Sertab Goes to the Club was released. In July, she released the single "I Remember Now" as a part of project DRUM, which aimed to increase tolerance and respect among different cultures. In September, to celebrate her 15th year of career, she gave a concert at Cemil Topuzlu Open-Air Theater together with Sezen Aksu, Levent Yüksel, Nil Karaibrahimgil, Fahir Atakoğlu, Özge Fışkın and Demir Demirkan. The concert included three parts "Death and Life", "Rebirth" and "Love", during which she told her own life's story in songs. In "Death and Life", she performed songs in relation to how she dealt with ulcerative colitis, followed by "Rebirth", which focused on the part of her life during which she got rid of her disease and took advantage of her life by rising to fame. In the final part, "Love", she displayed how she found happiness thanks to Demir Demirkan's love. In December 2008, footage of her concert were released in the live album Sertab Erener Otobiyografi: 15. Sanat Yılı Konseri. Hürriyets Onur Baştürk named the album the best work of 2008 praising how she told "her life's story in songs and expressed her philosophy".
In January 2008, Erener and a number of artists took photographs with street animals. These photographs were made into a calendar, and the proceeds from selling it were used to make shelters for these animals. In the same year, she played in the commercials for Sunsilk, for which she performed her song "Hayat Beklemez". In July–August 2008, she went on a tour with Emre Aydın for the Fanta and gave 18 concerts across Turkey. In order to promote Turkey's culture in the Netherlands, she performed at the Turkey Now festival in October. She later performed the song "Bu Gece Son" for Uzay Heparı's tribute album Uzay Heparı - Sonsuza, which was released in December. In 2007-08 she discussed working on a new album, which she later recorded in Los Angeles together with Demir Demirkan and released it in June 2009 under the title Painted on Water. Erener and Demirkan gave their group's name to the album. The two turned a number of türküs into English and released them in the form of jazz. Demirkan described the album as "Anatolian music and jazz and blues mixed with Western instruments". At the end of 2009, Erener played in the commercials for Turkish Derivatives Exchange.
"Açık Adres" won the Best Melody award at the Kral TV Video Music Awards. The album became one of the best-selling albums of the year and Erener won the Best Female Pop Artist award at the Kral TV Video Music Awards. In 2010, Erener's name appeared in the textbooks for Contemporary Turkish and World History courses at the fourth grades of high schools. In the book, it was written that Erener's victory in the Eurovision Song Contest was the first major success of Turkish pop music in the international arena.
In April 2012, she released the classical Turkish album Ey Şûh-i Sertab, which was dedicated to her father Nizamettin Erener, after one year of preparations. Thanks to the album, which included 15 old classical Turkish songs, Erener won the "Best Female Classical Turkish Music Soloist" award at the Golden Butterfly Awards. She later performed the song "Dım Dım" for Ozan Çolakoğlu's first album which was released in June 2012. The music video for the song came out in July 2012. In April 2013, she released her new album, Sade.
In July 2015, Erener married her boyfriend Emre Kula in Seferihisar, İzmir, after 6 months of dating.
In 2015, together with her husband guitarist Emre Kula, bassist Eser Ünsalan, keyboardist Ozan Yılmaz and drummer Alpar Lu she found the group Oceans of Noise and they started to make English rock music. In 2017, the group's first Extended play was released. At the same time, they did the soundtrack for the movie . Beginning in late 2017, Erener started to perform on a musical titled Sertab'ın Müzikali to mark the 25th year of her career. During the musical, which consisted of two separate sections, Erener performed her hit songs from 1990s and 2000s and was accompanied by professional dancers. The preparations for the musical began in 2015 and Beyhan Murphy served as the show's choreographer. The show also continued in 2018 and 2019. Eda Ünsün of Milliyet praised Erener and her band's performance together the show's visuals adding that "a musical spree started in Turkey under the leadership of Erener".
In 2018, Oceans of Noise released their second EP Not Safe. In the same year, Erener released the singles "Bastırın Kızlar" and "Belki de Dönerim" in July and December respectively. The songs were both produced by Emre Kula and written by Can Bonomo.
On 5 June 2020, the song "Bu Dünya" was released as a promotional single for Erener's new studio album. Her twelfth studio album, Ben Yaşarım, was released on 12 June 2020. Musicians such as Emre Kula, Ersel Serdarlı, Doğan Duru, Can Bonomo and Sezen Aksu contributed to this album. Writing for Hürriyet, Hikmet Demirkol praised the songs, mentioning that "Sertab Erener is with us again with a dynamic album, full of detail and depth."
Erener performed "Everyway That I Can" as one of the interval acts in the second semi-final of the Eurovision Song Contest 2024 in Malmö.
Her fourth album Sertab Erener was found "far from experimental works and more settled" compared to her previous three albums. Her fifth album, Turuncu, was released with the purpose to connect people with life through a positive energy. She also demolished the image she had created with the song "Zor Kadın (Difficult Woman)" in the previous album with "Güle Güle Şekerim (Bye Bye Sweetie)" in the new one. "Everyway That I Can", with which she joined Eurovision in 2003, was decorated with ethnic motifs and was a mixture of classical pop and Turkish music. Her seventh album, Aşk Ölmez, was prepared in a very unpretentious way. With Aşk Ölmez, Erener put aside the idea of "I have to show all the information I've ever had in the first five minutes of the song, and I must reveal my voice there!". She later talked about the album: "It's a little bit fooling around with the idea of love and being human.. I believe there is a philosophy behind it. There are also small jokes, but the album is about women and men and their relationships.... I tried to write about the conflicts that we have in between us, sometimes by taking it as a joke, and sometimes taking it seriously. These are the problems of the majority of people; after all, I don't live anything apart from them. As a person who lives in a big city, I talk about such person's issues. Based on these, I wrote the lyrics of the album." Together with Demir Demirkan, she released the jazz fusion album Painted On Water, which included türküs that were rewritten in English and re-performed. With her eighth album Rengârenk, she put "diva acts aside" and sang in a more calm manner.
1992–1998: Sakin Ol!, Lâ'l and Sertab Gibi
She later described her illness with these words: "There was a wound in my bowel which didn't heal for years. Hospitals, diets, resting, beds... I used to go to the bathroom 35 times a day. My intestines could not hold anything." All of her large intestine was taken out during the surgery and, as a result, she had to walk with a bag in her hand for a year. She began to question her own existence as she thought she was going to die from the disease, and in her head she started asking questions such as "Why am I here? Why me?". Thus, she started studying philosophy books and began meditation.
1999–2004: Sertab Erener, Turuncu, Eurovision and No Boundaries
2005–2009: Aşk Ölmez and Painted on Water
2010–2015: Rengârenk, Ey Şûh-i Sertab and Sade
Besides these five songs, separate music videos were also released for the songs "Bir Damla Gözlerimde" and "Bir Çaresi Bulunur". Cansel Elçin appeared alongside Erener in the music video for "Bir Damla Gözlerimde".
2016–present: Kırık Kalpler Albümü and Ben Yaşarım
Artistry
Music style and voice
Influences
Awards
1995 1st Kral Tv Video Music Awards Best Pop Female Artist 2000 6st Kral Tv Video Music Awards Best Pop Female Artist Best Lyrics (Vur Yüreğim) 2001 28th Golden Butterfly Awards Best Turkish Pop Music Female Soloist 2002 8th Kral Tv Video Music Awards Best Pop Female Artist 2004 10th Kral Tv Video Music Awards Song of the Year (Everyway That I Can) Honorary Award 2010 14th Istanbul Fm Golden Awards (IFA) Best Pop Female Artist 2010 2nd Survey Feast Awards Most Popular Female Artist 2011 17th Kral Tv Video Music Awards Best Female Artist 2012 39th Golden Butterfly Awards Best Turkish Art Music Female Soloist 2015 1st Gossip Time Year End Awards Best Clip & Song with a Message (Kız Leyla) 2017 14th Radio Boğaziçi Music Awards Best Album (Kırık Kalpler Album) 2021 PowerTürk Music Awards Most Powerful Album (Ben Yaşarım) 2021 PowerTürk Music Awards Best Female Singer
Discography
Filmography
Television
2002 Ti Show Herself 2011 Star Akademi 2014 Yalan Dünya Episode 76 Arkadaşım Hoşgeldin 2015 Sesi Çok Güzel 2018 Jet Sosyete Episode 26 2020 Episode 59
Further reading
External links
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