Đorđe Novković

Đorđe Novković (2 September 1943 - 6 May 2007) was a Croatian songwriter who was known for his work in Yugoslavia and Croatia. Novković composed more than 2,500 songs and sold approximately 20 million records. He is also known as the father of popular Croatian singer Boris Novković.

Biography Novković was born to a Serb father Vukašin and a Croat mother Danica during World War II in the village of Vladimirci on the German-occupied territory of what only a few years earlier used to be Kingdom of Yugoslavia's Drina Banovina. He moved to Sarajevo at an early age, so his musical talent was discovered very early, and he joined the musical school in Sarajevo at the age of 6. After graduating conducting from Musical Academy in Sarajevo, he founded a band Pro Arte during the fall of 1967. In 1968, Đorđe's wife Ozana gave birth to their son Boris, and the family moved to Zagreb. Boris later became a rock singer-songwriter, but he split abruptly with his father at the age of 19. Đorđe's first hit came in 1969 with the song "Više se nećeš vratiti" (You Will Not Return) performed by Mišo Kovač and sold in half a million copies, and a later version in 1985 had similar success. In 1973, Pro Arte merged with another Sarajevo pop group Indexi, but the experiment lasted only several months. Pro Arte existed in continuity until 1980, as well as off-and-on throughout the 1980s. In 1989 Novković moved to live…Citește mai mult

Death He died suddenly at the age of 63, from an apparent stroke, in Zagreb. In a funeral ceremony he was buried in Zagreb's Mirogoj Cemetery.