Knez

Knez, born Nenad Knežević on 5 December 1967 in Titograd, today's Podgorica, is a Montenegrin pop singer and songwriter based in Belgrade. He rose to fame as a dance-pop singer in the 1990s and is best known for "Da l' si ikada mene voljela", and in 2015 he represented Montenegro at the Eurovision Song Contest.

He grew up in a family of musicians. At six he sang "Bio jednom jedan lav" at the Naša radost children's festival in Titograd and then became a soloist of the children's choir Suncokrili. In high school he started his first band, Visoka frekvencija, with the guitarist Leo Đokaj, and it was then that he wrote "Da l' si ikada mene voljela" and "Kao magija", the songs that later made his name. He went on to play the Montenegrin coast with The Moon Band and then performed in the Montenegro Band with his father, Milija Mili Knežević.

His solo career began in 1992 at the MESAM festival in Belgrade with "Da l' si ikada mene voljela". His first album, Kao magija (1994), made with Leo Đokaj and the songwriters Ljubo and Zlatko Jovović, was a big success and brought him an album of the year award from PGP-RTS, the Oskar popularnosti and the Zlatni hit of TV Novosti. Iz dana u dan followed in 1996 and Automatic, his best-selling album, in 1997. In 1999 came the compilation The Best of Knez, and his biggest concert was at the Sava Centar in Belgrade.

In 2000 he won the festival in Budva with "Vjeruj", and he released the albums Daleko, visoko (2000), Ti me znaš (2003), Vanilla (2005), Otrov i med (2008) and Opa cupa (2012), with the compilation Balade in 2006. He sang at Sunčane skale in 2002, 2007 and 2008, finished third in Budva in 2006, and tried for Eurovision with "Navika" at Evropesma 2004 and in Montenegro's selection of 2008, where he came third. His ballad "Bubamara" is a duet with the actor Branislav Lečić. He was also on the TV shows Survivor Srbija VIP (2010) and Tvoje lice zvuči poznato (2013 and 2019).

On 31 October 2014 he was announced as Montenegro's singer for Vienna, following Sergej Ćetković. His song "Adio" was written by Željko Joksimović, Marina Tucaković and Dejan Ivanović, and he also recorded it in English and French. He came ninth in the second semi-final and thirteenth in the final with 44 points, Montenegro's best result at the contest.

He has kept releasing music since, including a new version of "Da l' si ikada mene voljela" in 2024 and the videos "Stranac", "Viva la vida" and "Finale". His daughter Ksenija Knežević sang in the girl group Hurricane.