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Teya Dora

Teodora Pavlovska (Serbian Cyrillic: Теодора Павловска; born 1 May 1992), known professionally as Teya Dora (Serbian: Теја Дора / Teja Dora), is a Serbian singer, songwriter, and producer. Born in Bor, she debuted in 2018 and rose to popularity with the 2023 single "Džanum", which went internationally viral on TikTok.

She represented Serbia in the Eurovision Song Contest 2024 in Malmö, Sweden, with the song "Ramonda", finishing in 17th place.

Early life

Pavlovska was born on 1 May 1992 in Bor, FR Yugoslavia. Her father was a painter and a graphic designer. Her mother is a writer and journalist with Večernje novosti, whose expertise is Vlach magic and culture. After moving to Belgrade, Pavlovska started attending music school, through which she received a scholarship to study at the Berklee College of Music in Boston, United States. At her audition, she sang "No One" by Alicia Keys. While at Berklee, she shared classes with Charlie Puth. She graduated from college in 2014, and at her graduation ceremony, she received her diploma from Jimmy Page. After graduating, Pavlovska lived in New York City, where she worked as a songwriter.

Career

After returning to Serbia in 2018, Pavlovska initially began collaborating with singer Nikolija, by writing her 2018 single "Nema limita". She continued writing songs for other Serbian artists, including Nataša Bekvalac and Anastasija Ražnatović. She made her own recording debut, under the name Teya Dora, with the single "Da na meni je", released in July 2019 under Bassivity Digital. Her chosen stage name stems from the fact that while studying at Berklee, Americans didn't know how to pronounce her name; "Teya Dora" was the closest that they could get to pronouncing Teodora.

After several other singles, Teya Dora gained prominence in 2023 with the song "Džanum", recorded for the television series Južni vetar: Na granici. The song went internationally viral on TikTok, generating the internet meme "Moye moye". "Džanum" was especially used on the platform during protests following the 2023 Belgrade school shooting. The official music video for the song has accumulated over 75 million views on YouTube and over a hundred million streams on Spotify. Furthermore, the single peaked at number four on Spotify's Daily Viral Songs Global chart on 22 May, and Teya Dora became the third Serbian artist to have over a million monthly listeners on the streaming service. The other two, Konstrakta and Luke Black, achieved that during their participation in the Eurovision Song Contest. "Džanum" also entered the top ten on Billboard's Croatia Songs chart.

In December 2023, Teya Dora was announced as a contestant on Pesma za Evroviziju '24, with the song "Ramonda". After qualifying for the second semi-final, she eventually won the competition on 2 March 2024, by coming first in the jury vote and second in the televote, and thus became Serbia's entrant in the Eurovision Song Contest 2024 in Malmö, Sweden. Teya Dora qualified from the first semi-final on 7 May 2024, placing 10th out of 15, with 47 points. In the grand final on 11 May 2024, she placed 17th out of 25, with 54 points. Teya Dora also composed Mimica's entry for Dora 2024, "Koeko", but the song did not make it into the contest.