Zuzi Zu

Zuzi Zu, born Zumreta Midžić, is a singer, musician and songwriter from Velika Kladuša who for many years lived and worked in Sarajevo and Zagreb. Her range runs from pop-rock and disco to Romani songs and the Bosnian sevdalinka, and for decades she was one of the best-known backing voices in Yugoslav music.

She grew up in Velika Kladuša and in the early 1970s took part in TV Zagreb's first talent show for young performers, "Nova imena, novi zabavljači", where an audition with Šerbo Alajbegović earned her a first television appearance singing "Moj dilbere kud se šećeš" with his orchestra. In Sarajevo she studied economics while attending the secondary music school, and she joined the RTV Sarajevo choir under Julio Marić, who chose her to sing backing vocals at the 1976 Vaš šlager sezone, the year Kemal Monteno won with "Sarajevo, ljubavi moja". She then sang backing vocals with Gordana Ivandić on the great Yugoslav tour of Zdravko Čolić and Indexi, and the two formed the duo Rock Hotel, with the single "Disco / Blue Jeans" on Jugoton.

For Goran Marković's film Nacionalna klasa she sang the punk song "Hoby" and backing vocals on the theme "Floyd". From 1979 to 1982 she and Ivandić sang in the disco group Mirzino jato with Mirza Alijagić, whose hits included "Apsolutno tvoj", "Normalna stvar" and "Čarter let", and they took "Ja bih da me druga mazi" to Vaš šlager sezone in 1980. Alongside music she worked for sixteen years in the state administration and did postgraduate study at the Institute of Social Studies in The Hague.

In 1987 she sang backing vocals for Bijelo dugme on Pljuni i zapjevaj moja Jugoslavijo and its tour, and on the live album Mramor, kamen i željezo. She also sang the backing vocals of "Ederlezi" in Emir Kusturica's film Dom za vešanje. With the support of Himzo Polovina she recorded her first sevdalinka, "Moj beharu ko li mi te bere", followed by about twenty more with the RTV Sarajevo orchestras, and she sang at concerts with Safet Isović. Her backing vocals are also on records by Frano Lasić, Hari Mata Hari, Halid Bešlić and Boban Rajović.

Her first solo album, Noćas ja ludujem, came out on Sarajevo Disk in 1991, with every song written by Milić Vukašinović, Zoran Redžić producing, and the hit "Bekrija". In 2005 in Zagreb she joined the band Kad sam bio bijelo dugme with three former singers of Bijelo dugme, Željko Bebek, Tifa and Alen Islamović, touring Europe and the Balkans for four years.

Her second album took years: between 2009 and 2017 she recorded eighteen songs at Studio Kobac in Belgrade with producer Aleksandar Kobac, among them "Vatra", "Delija", "Ružica si bila", "Žena istoka", "Trag ljubavi", "Plava banana" and "Ederlezi", released on the CD Made in Sarajevo, where she is also the author of most of the music and lyrics. In 2013 she took part in the reality show Farma 5.