Friday, April 20, 2007

Yugo Girlpop: Sanjalice

Back again, this time with a a real treat for obscure girlgroup lovers.
Sanjalice (Dreamers) were one of, probably not many, girl bands in 60's Yugoslavia. They had a relatively short career, and as I know of, released 3 EP's. The girls were: Ljiljana Mandic, Slobodanka Miscevic, Ljiljana Jeftic and Snezana Veselinovic. They played their own instruments.
Slobodanka Miscevic (guitar) was the best student in her class and Ljiljana Jeftic (bass) was only 15 years old.
They mostly recorded coverversions of Italian and English language hits including Those were the days (Mary Hopkins), a fantastic cover of Happy together (Turtles) and the 1965 San Remo song Io che non vivo senza te (You don't have to say you love me, the Dusty Springfield classic). Their Puppet On A String is sung in Serbo-Croat (that's what it was called in the Yugoslavia era).
Other popular Yugo girlgroups: Lutke and Sigele

Sanjalice - Marioneta/Lutka na koncu (Puppet on a string)
Sanjalice - Srecni zajedno (Happy Together)
Sanjalice - Bez Reci (Without words)

Extra: Yugoslavian article about Sanjalice. You are more than welcome to translate some interesting facts!

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

I really enjoyed this post! I didn't know a thing about Yugoslavia girl groups. Many thanks for sharing these Sanjalice songs.

Anonymous said...

Great post! The more "behind the Iron Curtain" girls you can come up with, the better! It's really difficult to find out about them, other than maybe the Czech girls. Have you got any more of these? It doesn't appear there is a cd of Sanjalice music.

Mostly said...

OMG Sanjalice, thankyou! I love 'Bez Reci' and have been looking for more for ages. Fantastic!

Max said...

Thanks--great group!

awopbopaloobopalopbamboom said...

I'm an addict of girl group sound and i'm very recognizing for this post.

Anonymous said...

This is a translation of the article from this link:
http://www.barikada.com/vremeplov/kao_nekad_u_8/2005-12-14_vis_sanjalice.php

Dear Barricade readers,
After long time we are starting little time trip, on ex-Yugoslavia area. We are going back in 60's, and our aim is group of four pretty girls, who have lived in capital of ex-Yu, Belgrade, and they've been played in band called Sanjalice.
On ex-Yugoslavian area, horrors of The WW2 have been forgotten a bit, and also life standard raised a lot. The people were full of optimism and they believed that the future is going to be much better. Unfortunately, every future brings with it whatever it wants, but not what we want.
Young people of that era started to buy gramophones and records and little by little, some of them started to play music which was analogous to world trends. Communist party wasn't quite phrenetic, but the communists didn't do anything openly against those influences. Like mushrooms on good ground, in all parts of ex-YU numerous vocally-instrumentally bands springed up to entertain the youth.
I put time coordinates in our time machine and we are in The Pioneer City (Belgrade) at the moment, at the end of 1964. More precisely, on december 29th 1964. Unfortunatelly, the navigator I count on him, and who knows music scene of that time very well, cancelled the trip. because he doesn't like public affaires. I must say that this trip couldn't be realized due to very important facts I got from him. The aim of our trip is newly formed girl group, later known as Sanjalice (Dreamers).
First big surprise for me was the fact that the girl group Sanjalice had 5 members, including two men. Three girls at the end of the eighth grade, and two young men. These two boys played drums and keyboards. Group would stay with mixed line up, when former Yugoslav National Army (YNA) was involved. Vojislav Veljkovic joined in YNA at the end of 1966. and Radomir Vukovic stayed the only male member of the group. Instead Vojislav Veljkovic, his girlfriend Snezana Veselinovic, who was playing the drums, became the member of the group. Shortly after that, Radomir Vukovic left the band, and from that moment Sanjalice is the band with female line up. Those four girls: Ljiljana Mandic, Slobodanka Miscevic, Ljiljana Jeftic and newcomer Snezana Veselinovic continued performing as a girlgroup named Sanjalice.
Was it an aspiration for a female emantipation, exclusivity or just an insufficiency of new male musicians, it is hard to reconstruct right now. Anyway, a girl group in that time was a small sensation. Sanjalice started a successful carrer. In 1967. girls won the first prize on some music competition. Numerous bands stayed behind their backs, and I just can imagine how male bands felt losing from the girls.
Sanjalice was performing in Serbian provincs Vojvodina, backing Mija Aleksic, one of the most popular actors and entertainers in ex-Yugoslavia.
In the very same 1967. Sanjalice accepted an offer to perform as a part of the travelling music caravan called "Pesma leta" (The song of the summer). Youn girls joined the company of the most popular singers and bands, and they expanded their popularity on larger auditorium. This music caravan was composed from professional musicians mainly. On "Pesma leta" in 1967. performers were: Lola Novakovic, Anica Zubovic, Gabi Novak, Ljiljana Petrovic, Majda Sepe, Arsen Dedic, Dusan Jaksic, Miki Jevremovic, Minja Subota, Ivica Serfezi i Sasa Subota orchestra.
Sanjalice had first international tour in Romania, including performances on Romanian national television and radio. On the way back from Romania, on Temisvar airport (they were playing on fashion shows of Aleksandar Joksimovic in Temisvar) the two Ljiljanas were forgotten with all the instruments, by the fashion crew. They manage to get back home by hitch-hiking, but they had a lot of troubles on duane, explaining what they are doing with all those instruments.
On concert in Herceg Novi, Montenegro, Liljana Mandic's guitar was stolen. Later it was found and returned back after a lot of troubles. At that time, custom laws were very sharp, and quality imported instruments were very rare.
In the summer of 1968. Sanjalice were on tour in Istra, a Croation province. They were playing in Pula every weekend, in the Hous of the Army. In that moment, it was a life of professional musicians, which must be unpleasent for girls, because they started to study for a test for college. They should rehearsal regularly, performing every night and studying. They hadn't time for swimming and enjoying on sea. Sanjalice were performing in some kind of uniforms, but uniforms disappeared one day. It was a very unpleasent situation, but luckilly, they were found. On some other tour, after the show in Zadar, girls were all scratched by the bunch of fans, who asked for pictures and autographs.
Sanjalice released three EPs, including 12 songs, which was small number, considering their popularity. It can be explained with the fact that they had a lot of other engagements. On records they played mostly covers of world hits, but they also played a song of Yugoslavian author Vlaho Paljetak, called "Marijana".
In 1969. they decided to finish their music carrer, because they wanted to do things of their own. Ljijana Mandic graduated on Medical school in the age of 23. Today, she is respectable expert for rheumatic disease. Slobodanka Miscevic graduated in Economic school. Ljiljana Jevtic turned to creative arts, and she creates art objects. Snezana Veselinovic finished high school and right after that she got married. I'm happy to inform you that all four girls from Sanjalice are still alive and that band could, theoretically, perform again on some veteran reunion show.
As I told before, the discography of Sanjalice isn't rich, because of rare recording sesssions. Their recorded songs:

VIS Sanjalice_Marijana_Vlaho Paljetak
VIS Sanjalice_To su bili dani_Raskin (vocal by Ljilja)
VIS Sanjalice_Bez reci
VIS Sanjalice_Haj Lili, haj-lo
VIS Sanjalice_Marioneta (vocal by Doda)
VIS Sanjalice_Mi mladi
VIS Sanjalice_Misli ponekad na mene (vocal by Doda)
VIS Sanjalice_Ta mala ledi
VIS Sanjalice_Nemoj reci da me volis (vocal by Doda)
VIS Sanjalice_Srecni zajedno (vocal by Ljilja)
VIS Sanjalice_Znam da ces se vratit (vocal by Ljilja)
VIS Sanjalice_Idem u svet (vocal by Ljilja)


Information about Sanjalice given directly by members of the band and their friends and fans.

Best regards,
Nadir Efendić


Note: VIS is a prefix that every pop band of 60's had in their name. It means Vokalno Instrumentalni Sastav, which means Vocally-Instrumental Group.

Anonymous said...

無料で出会うなら無料出会い、どうせ会うならサクラのいない出会い系なんかの出会いがいいよ。
ゲームするならエロフラとかエロゲーとかも好きですよ!
将来不安だから占いなんかしてる、他力本願は好きじゃないけど、楽しいし、ポイント購入したりお金がかかるけど、万が一お金がなくなって、お金を借りたいなら、クレジットカード現金化すればいいと思う。
あと、最近カラコンをカラコン通販で買っちゃった。