Karel Gott
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Karel Gott (born July 14, 1939) is one of the most successful and widely-known Czech singers (crooners).
Born in Plzeň, Western Bohemia, Gott was initially trained as a mechanic; at the same time, he performed as an amateur singer in various Prague pubs of the late 1950s. In the 1960s he started to study singing at the Prague Conservatoire, his first short record Měsíční řeka (a Czech version of Henry Mancini's "Moon River") being issued in 1962. Since 1963 Gott rapidly occupied a leading position on the Czechoslovak pop scene, while his first international successes followed his five month stay in Las Vegas. In 1969, Gott won the music festival in Rio de Janeiro with composer Karel Svoboda's hit Lady Carneval. Between 1965, when his first LP Zpívá Karel Gott ("Karel Gott Sings") was published, and the mid 1990s, 50 LP's of Gott were published by Czech publishing house Supraphon, making him the best selling performer in the Czech music business. At the same time, more than 80 records were published abroad, most of them on the Polydor label. In the late 1960s, Gott started his career in German-speaking countries as well. As part of this popularity, he represented Austria in the Eurovision Song Contest 1968, singing Tausend Fenster.
As of 2006 Karel Gott is still singing.
Gott was a signatory in 1978 of the "anti-charter." The anti-charter was a petition organized by the communist government to counter the so-called Charter '77 signed by Vaclav Havel (Czech president from 1990-2002) and other dissidents to protest the Czechoslovak government's violation of the 1976 Helsinki accords on human rights. Gott was seen at the time as a stooge of communist forces and has never properly explained his involvement in helping to suppress the dissident movement.
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- www.karelgott.com — official homepage
- karel-gott.de — official homepage for German-speaking countries
- www.karelgott.net — unofficial site
- An Interactive VR Panorama of Karel Gott, arriving at Vaclav Havel's 70th birthday party, 4 October 2006
