Dunja Rajter

Dunja Rajter is a singer and actress from Croatia who made her name in Germany. She was born on 3 March in Našice, in Slavonia, and grew up with music: as a schoolgirl she sang in the children's choir led by her father, Rudolf Rajter, a music teacher in Zagreb. She trained at the theatre academy in Zagreb and joined the ensemble of a Zagreb theatre.

She is on Muzika-Balkan as a Croatian artist because she was born and raised in Croatia, and Croatian and Balkan songs run through her records. In 1964 the German producer Horst Lippmann saw her on a Yugoslav television show and brought her to Germany, where she has lived ever since. Her home today is Langen in Hesse.

German audiences first knew her from film and television: she played in Winnetou in 1963 and Unter Geiern a year later, and appeared on shows such as Der goldene Schuß and Einer wird gewinnen. Her early albums carried her roots with them, from Lieder aus Jugoslawien in 1965 to Lieder vom Balkan in 1967, and Slawische Seele, made with Ivan Rebroff, Tatjana Iwanow and the Troika balalaika ensemble, reached number 11 in Germany in 1968.

In the early 1970s her schlager songs were hits. "Salem Aleikum (Darla Dirladada)" reached number 39 in Germany in 1971, and songs such as "Was ist schon dabei", "Meine Malaika" and "Junges Herz" followed. She sang on the ZDF-Hitparade in 1977 and 1980, toured Europe with Ivan Rebroff and appeared on Harry Belafonte's American television show. Her style moved between schlager and chanson, and from 1986 she also played cabaret with Georg Danzer, Klaus Hoffmann and Konstantin Wecker.

On stage she later played the Buhlschaft in Jedermann in Berlin, Golde in Anatevka in Trier and roles at the Karl May festival in Bad Segeberg. Her memoir, Nur nicht aus Liebe weinen, came out in 2018, and her album Ich will das Leben spüren entered the German album chart in 2021. The playlist mixes her German hits with Croatian songs such as "Kad ja pođoh" and her television performances.