Costi Ioniță

Who is Costi Ioniță?

Costi Ioniţă is a Romanian singer, songwriter, and record producer, regarded as one of the most celebrated ethnic Romanian vocalist of muzică orientală. Born in Constanţa, he began his musical career by singing Romanian traditional music. He however achieved fame as a member of the pop boy band Valahia, launching several hits. In 1999 he started to experiment with manele, a composite Balkanic musical style, and in 2000 he collaborated with acclaimed manele singer Adrian Minune on Of, viaţa mea, one of the first mainstream successes of the genre in Romania. Following Valahia's dissolution in 2002, he started a solo career, concentrating on manele. In this period he collaborated with several well known manele singers. His success is considered unusual, as he is one of the few ethnic Romanian in a genre perceived as Romani. Also, unlike his Romani counterparts, Costi Ioniţă does not use a nickname. Despite his success in manele, he also experimented with other musical styles, such as rock, dance or opera, avoiding to be identified with manele or to be too closely associated with the Romani culture.