Karolina Gočeva

Karolina Gočeva is a Macedonian pop singer, born on 28 April 1980 in Bitola. Often called simply Karolina, she started singing as a child and has been on stage since the early 1990s, moving between pop, ethno-influenced songs, rock and jazz.

Her breakthrough came at the Si-Do children's festival in Bitola. At Makfest 91 in Štip she sang "Mamo, pušti me" and won the award for the most successful debut, and in 1992 that song gave its name to her first children's album. From 1994 she was a regular at Skopje Fest, with "Koj da ti kaže", "Ma, ajde kaži mi" (ninth in 1996) and "Ukradeni noḱi" (fourth in 1998).

In 2000 she signed with Avalon Production and released Jas imam pesna, which includes "Nemir", her duet with Toše Proeski; "Sakaj me" and "Bez ogled na se" followed. Znaeš kolku vredam came out in 2003, and the same year Kad zvezde nam se sklope... kao nekada, her first album in Serbian. Vo zaborav (2005) also appeared in a Serbian version, U zaboravu.

Karolina represented Macedonia at the Eurovision Song Contest twice, the first artist to do so. She won the national selection in 2002 with "Od nas zavisi" and finished 19th, and in 2007 she returned with "Mojot svet" and placed 14th in the final in Helsinki. Along the way she came third at Sunčane Skale in 2001 with "Kaži mi".

The traditional-flavoured Makedonsko devojče (2008) won Best Ethno Album at Sunčane Skale and was the best-selling album in Macedonia that year; Makedonsko devojče 2 repeated that in 2014. Kapka pod neboto followed in 2010, Izvor in 2018, and in 2022 Pesni za ljubov i kopnež, recorded with Duke Bojadžiev and Ismail Lumanovski.

She has worked with many other artists: "Kraj" with Wikluh Sky, "Koj da mi zapee" with Joss Stone, filmed in Skopje in 2016, the campaign song "Moj je život moja pjesma" with Nina Badrić and Maya Sar, and live duets with Elena Risteska and Lozano. Recent singles include "Daj na sunce" and "Mog života dio".