Gülben Ergen

Gülben Ergen — Biography

Gülben Ergen (born 25 August 1972 in Kadıköy, Istanbul) is a Turkish singer, actress and model. She studied at Erenköy Girls' High School; after beginning her career in modelling and acting she entered the music business as a headline singer, and from the late 1990s onwards she became one of Turkey's best-known pop singers.

Her first work in front of the camera was in cinema and television. She took her first film role as Meral in Av (1989), and then appeared as Zeynep in Fırat (1997) and as Marziye in Marziye (1998).

Her music career began with her first album, Merhaba, released in 1997, followed by Kör Aşık (1999). The lead single from her 2002 album Sade ve Sadece was named Best Composition of the Year at the Turkey Music Awards. Her 2004 album Uçacaksın sold 600,000 copies and earned a diamond certification from MÜ-YAP. She went on to release Fıkır Fıkır 9+1 (2005), the self-titled Gülben Ergen (2006) and Aşk Hiç Bitmez (2008). In 2009, "Giden Günlerim Oldu", from the album Uzun Yol Şarkıları and recorded with Oğuzhan Koç, stayed at number one on the Turkish charts for a long time. In later years she released the albums Hayat Bi Gün... (2011), Kalbimi Koydum (2015) and Seni Kırmışlar (2020), as well as singles such as Şıkır Şıkır (2011), Esasen (2017), İnfilak (2018), Müsaadenle (2019) and Nanik (2024).

Alongside singing she continued to act. She became widely known for the character Melek in the comedy series Dadı (2001); for her performance in this adaptation of the American series The Nanny she won the Best Actress award at the Golden Butterfly Awards in 2001. She later played Hürrem Sultan in the series Hürrem Sultan (2003), Gönül in Gönül (2006) and Gülbahar in the film Vezir Parmağı (2017).

She married Mustafa Erdoğan, and the marriage produced three sons: Atlas and the twins Ares and Güney. A mother of three, Ergen was named "Mother of the Year" at the 2018 OnurAkayMedya Awards of the Year. As of 2015 her albums had sold more than 2 million copies in total.