Dragan Pantić Smederevac

Dragan Pantić Smederevac is a Serbian folk singer, born on 27 June 1955 in the village of Drugovac near Smederevo, the town his stage name comes from. Already in the second grade of primary school he showed a gift for folk songs, singing mostly the repertoire of Bora Spužić Kvaka, and it was with Kvaka that he later earned his first serious money as a singer, at the Kolubara mines.

After secondary school he graduated from the Faculty of Economics in Subotica and worked for the trading company Dunav. In 1984 he left his steady job to devote himself to music. He appeared at the Ilidža festival with "Teško nama bez nas dvoje", a song by Ruždija Krupa and Miša Mijatović, and in 1988 he signed with PGP RTB; at 33 he was starting late, but his career rose quickly from there.

He worked with the songwriters Dragan Aleksandrić, Predrag Vuković Vukas, Dobrivoje Ivanković, Ljubo Kešelj and Dragan Stojković Bosanac. Among his hits are "Otvori se zemljo da propadnem", "Oj, devojko Smederevko" and "Vrati se, devojko", and in the traditional Šumadija sound "Mrak, mrak, pomrčina", "Dano, rano", "Smederevo grade od starina", "Vodenica potočara", "Majkin sin sam ja", "Moj živote, životiću" and "Ti si knjiga pisana za mene". His records came out on PGP RTB, ZAM and PGP RTS, and he has recorded some 300 songs.

He was a regular at the folk festivals of the time: Ilidža in 1988 with "Odnela si deo mog života", Šumadijski sabor in 1989, 1990 and 1992 to 1994, the Hit parada in 1989 and 1992 and Moravski biseri in 1994 and 1995. His biggest hits are counted as "Moj živote, životiću", "Imam samo osam ari" and "Mrak, mrak, pomrčina". In 2019 he was named a National Music Artist of Serbia.

His son Radomir, an accordionist, often plays in his band, and together they have toured Europe and much of the world. His songs are gathered here in one playlist.