Emina Sandal

Emina Sandal — Biography

Emina Jahović, also known in Turkey as Emina Sandal and Emina Türkcan, is a Bosniak-origin pop singer, songwriter and actress. She rose to prominence in the Balkans with the albums Tačka and Radije ranije, and after settling in Turkey reached a wider audience as Lale Taşkıran Ilgaz in the series Lale Devri. Her music career has reached six studio albums, the latest, Svitanje, released in 2025.

She began music school at seven at the Mokranjac Music School and later studied management at the Braća Karić University in Belgrade. She first made her name at regional festivals, winning the Zlatna staza youth contest in Montenegro. Her debut album Tačka came out in 2002 on Dino Merlin's label, and the same year she placed fourth in Bosnia and Herzegovina's Eurovision preselection with "U la la". Radije ranije (2005) and Vila (2009) made her one of the region's best-known pop singers. In 2010 she was among the candidates to represent Serbia at Eurovision with "Ti kvariigro", composed by Goran Bregović. Her later albums were Metamorfoza (2014) and Dalje (2018).

On television she took the lead in Lale Devri in 2010, with her lines dubbed into Turkish. She was a judge on X Factor Adria in 2013 and on Rising Star Türkiye in 2016. Her brother Mirsad Türkcan was the first player to appear in the NBA as a Turkish citizen. She married Mustafa Sandal in 2008 and the couple divorced by mutual agreement in 2018; financial lawsuits between them drew press attention in later years.