Ajri Demirovski

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Ajri Demirovski (

Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, died 22 October 2009 in Karşıyaka, Turkey), was an ethnic Turkish singer from Yugoslavia
.

Early life and career

Demirovski was born to a poor family and started working in a barber shop when he was young. After his graduation, Ajri worked in the Zagreb printing houses of "Kermpuh" and "Rojamkovski". He also worked in Pula, Rijeka and Skopje before returning to his native town of Bitola in 1949. Ajri was not hired at the printing house in Bitola, "Kiro Dandaro" and so became a security guard at the newly established "Radio Bitola" radio station.[1]

The opportunity to work alongside some of the greatest Macedonian singers and songwriters inspired Ajri to create his own Macedonian

folk songs. It is believed that Ajri created over 80 folk songs in Macedonian. Despite the fact that Ajri was an ethnic Turk, none of his songs were written in Turkish.[2]

During his time at Radio Bitola, Ajri produced his most famous song to date "Bitola moj roden kraj" (Bitola, my birthplace).

Due to mass emigration in 1955, Ajri Demirovski moved to

Turkish culture. At the same time, his song "Bitola Moj Roden Kraj" was voted as song of the century by the citizens of Bitola.[3]

Ajri Demirovski died on 22 October 2009, at his home in the district of İzmir, Karşıyaka. Other than Turkish and Macedonian, he spoke Serbian, Bulgarian and Italian. Ajri was father of three children.

External links

References

  1. ^ "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 22 July 2011. Retrieved 27 October 2009.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  2. ^ "Bitola Top Destinations - Bitola Tourist Info".
  3. ^ Culture and Sports: Nicole Kidman in Kosovo SET Archived 15 November 2010 at the Wayback Machine