Tonči Huljić
Tonči Huljić (pronounced [tôntʃi xǔːʎitɕ]; born 29 October 1961) is a Croatian musician, songwriter and music producer.
Some of the most prominent music artists who collaborated with him include Jelena Rozga, Doris Dragović, Petar Grašo as well as Maksim Mrvica, Danijela Martinović, Minea and Jole.
In addition to his music career, Huljić has ventured into directing and coordinating theater shows and plays, TV series and sketches.
[7] Early on in his career, Huljić started collaborating and receiving advice from composer Zdenko Runjić who at the time also served as the main editor of Radio Split.
After achieving success at the Split Festival, the song was included in the eponymous Magazin album, which was released through Jugoton and received a Platinum certification.
In 1985, the song "Piši mi", performed at the Zagreb Festival of Contemporary Music achieved wide commercial success.
In 1986, Magazin released their fifth studio album titled Put putujem which received a diamond certification, sold 670.000 copies and produced several hit singles including "Put putujem", "Ti si želja mog života" and "Tri sam ti zime šaptala ime".
Singles released from the album include "Ljube se dobri, loši, zli", "Sijaj zvijezdo Danice", "Balkanska ulica", "Rano, ranije" and "Čekala je jedna žena".
In 1994, the band appeared at another festival in Split, titled Zvončac, where they performed the song "Simpatija" in collaboration with Marija Bubić.
In 1995, the band performed the song "Nostalgija" together with Lidija Horvat Dunjko at the 1995 Dora festival and subsequently won the competition.
This led to their performance at the 1995 Eurovision Song Contest held in Dublin where they received widespread acclaim and placed Croatia sixth on the competition.
[7] The following year, Martinović decided to leave the group to pursue a solo career, on which she continued working with Tonči Huljić as the main producer.
[8] In 1996, Magazin released their twelfth studio album titled Nebo boje moje ljubavi which was a big commercial success, and received a golden certification in Croatia.
[7] It produced several hit songs, including "Opijum", "Minut' srca tvog", "Nebo boje moje ljubavi" and "Samo navika" featuring Oliver Dragojević.
[9] In 1998, the group released Da si ti ja which was a commercial success in the region of former Yugoslavia, receiving a platinum certification in Croatia and Slovenia.
The album produced several singles, including "Gutljaj vina", "Ginem", "Na svijetu sve" and "Idi i ne budi ljude".
Despite achieving commercial success, some songs were not well received by music critics due to their "easy" and simple lyrics.
[18] On 22 November 2022, Huljić released a performance of "Temple of Zeus" together with an orchestra, for which he served as the musician, keyboard player, arranger and conductor.
During an interview, Huljić discussed Yugo-nostalgia, commenting that he believes many people tend to look at the past with the idea that circumstances were better, which according to him is not the case.
[22] In the 1990s, following the breakup of Yugoslavia, Huljić was among the first Croatian musicians to introduce elements of folk music from other former Yugoslav republics into his repertoire.
