Having risen to fame in her native Greece back in 2017, Marina Satti has managed to get her music heard across Europe thanks to her time at Eurovision. Although we have known her with her mix of urban rhythms with Greek folklore, the singer began her career in classical music schools. Today we summarize her biography and tell you what the songs on P.O.P., her new EP, are about.
Despite not having reached the top 10 in the Eurovision Song Contest, Greek singer Marina Satti has managed to attract a large number of new listeners during the week-long contest. And, although she has become internationally known thanks to her competing song, called ZARI, the interesting resumé that the singer has garnered over the years is remarkable.
Born in Athens in 1986, Marina Satti comes from a bicultural family: her mother is Greek and her father is Sudanese. This led her to be in contact with different ethnic rhythms from a very young age and to them was added the training in piano and classical voice that she received in her childhood and teen years. In 2004 she began studying a degree in Architecture at her local university, but she did not graduate as she decided to focus on music. Thus, she graduated in lyrical monody and jazz, receiving a scholarship to study composition at the Berklee College of Music for two semesters.
Later, she became part of the EBU European Jazz Orchestra and founded two female voice choirs called Fonés and Chóres, both dedicated to performing traditional Greek songs in archaeological sites such as the Theater of Epidaurus or the Odeon of Herodes Atticus.
She didn’t garner public recognition until 2016, when she posted her version of the Greek song Tha Spáso Koúpes on YouTube, which reached 28 million views on the platform. In 2017 she managed to enter the Greek charts with Mantissa, a song that, although maintaining its Greek roots, was closer to electronic pop. The song was certified Gold. In 2022, at the age of 35, she released her debut album, YENNA, which featured a slightly more synthetic sound.
TUCUTUM, the song that opens this new EP called P.O.P., was her first work under Minos, her current label, which is a Greek subsidiary of Universal Music. This song was a turning point in her artistic career, since the instrumental has a strong trap base that is more alike to the sound with which she has been known in Europe. The song gave Marina both the bitter and the sweet because, although it went viral in Greece, it was also criticized for her departure from folk fusion and for turning to a type of music the Greek public is not very used to.
The EP continues with ZARI, the song with which Marina Satti has represented her country at Eurovision. Its lyrics speak of uncertainty, repeating several times the phrase “Where will the wind take us? / I fall and spin like dice.” Her mix of Balkan sounds and reggaeton rhythms caught the attention of the European audience, which the singer has taken advantage of to reveal her new songs.
Her novelties begin with STIN IYIA MAS, whose sound is closer to her previous artistic identity. The title of the song is the Greek expression for making a toast. Using an eighties synthesizer, she asks the Virgin Mary for happiness and health for her loved one. The EP continues with LALALALA, which is inspired by Sousta, a traditional Cretan dance, usually performed at weddings, and promises to become one of the songs of the summer.
EIMAI KALA!!!!! is a brief fifty-second interlude in which we hear positive affirmations from the mouth of Katerina Salaka, a motivational coach who has become a human meme in Greece. The shortness of this track contrasts with the length of the next song, MIXTAPE, which, as its name suggests, could be a separate EP since it is 10 minutes long. The song contains multiple references to the criticism she has received in her country, both from journalists and other artists, as well as to Eurovision songs such as Angelina Mango's La Noia, Bambie Thug's Doomsday Blue or Düm tek tek, which Hadise sung to represent Turkey in 2009.
The EP closes with Ah THALASSA, an emotionally charged ballad dedicated to her father, who passed away two weeks before the singer took part in the festival. Marina talks about how her personality complemented that of her father, describing him as “a calm sea in which the birds are reflected” and herself as “a wave.” This idea is also written in the instrumental part with which the song ends: it begins with string instruments playing softly, but little by little they gain more strength. When the piece reaches its climax, it suddenly cuts off, like a radio that loses signal, ending abruptly like life itself.
Marina Satti got it right by representing herself as a wave, because P.O.P. is an EP as chaotic as a rough sea. Far from considering this as an insult, the artist takes ownership of this eclecticism to share with her listeners a work that shows all her facets. Although it is a listen that does not suit all audiences and seems to have been made taking advantage of riding the Eurovision wave, it perfectly shows the moment in which the singer finds herself right now.