Mustafa Sandal

Mustafa Sandal — Biography

Mustafa Sandal, born on 11 January 1970 in Istanbul, is a Turkish singer, songwriter, composer, producer and actor. He is also known by the nickname "Musti". Besides his native Turkish he speaks English, French and Italian, and his music is described as a synthesis that brings Western pop together with Eastern melodies, built for the most part on melancholic tones.

He pursued much of his education abroad: after Dost College in Tarabya he studied at the Collège du Léman in Geneva, went on to the business and economics faculty of the University of New Hampshire in the United States, and completed his bachelor's degree in management at the American College in London. In the early 1990s he made his name in the music industry by writing songs for many well-known singers; Ajda Pekkan, Sezen Aksu and Hakan Peker are among those who performed his material.

He released his first studio album Suç Bende in 1994, and its commercial success made him a nationally known artist in Turkey. With Gölgede Aynı in 1996 he won a number of awards; from the 1998 album Detay, the track Aya Benzer went to number one in the charts. He then signed with Sony Music and brought the album Araba to the international market; the tracks Araba and Aya Benzer markedly raised his profile abroad.

In 2000 he released his fourth studio album Akışına Bırak, and in 2002 Kop, which earned him a "Best Male Artist" award. In 2003 he issued Seven abroad on the Universal Music-Polydor label, followed a year later by İste in Turkey. The single İsyankar, released internationally in 2005, passed 150,000 copies in Germany and won a gold record. He then turned back towards the Turkish market with the albums Devamı Var in 2007 and Karizma in 2009.

In 2011 Şıkır Şıkır, released together with Gülben Ergen, became the most downloaded song of the year. After his tenth studio album Organik in 2012 he worked mainly on singles; Tesir Altında, from 2013, was one of the best-selling singles of the year. Reset with Eypio (2018), Mod with Zeynep Bastık (2019) and Damar in 2020 all reached number one in the charts. Sources put his worldwide album sales at between 14 and 20 million.

Alongside music he has worked in television, advertising and cinema. His acting began with Bay E in 1995 and was followed by the role of Acar in the 2010 film New York'ta Beş Minare and by the comedy series Başrolde Aşk, in which he took the lead; in 2013 he provided a voice for the animated film Uçaklar, and he also appeared in Arif v 216. In his private life he married the singer Emina Jahović in 2008; the couple had two sons, Yaman and Yavuz, and the marriage ended in 2018. Sandal married Melisa Sütşurup in 2022.