Grete Paia (born 27 August 1995) is an Estonian singer and songwriter. She is best known internationally for competing in ''

Eesti Laul 2013 Estonia participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 2013 with the song "Et uus saaks alguse" written by Mihkel Mattisen and Silvia Soro. The song was performed by Birgit. The Estonian broadcaster Eesti Rahvusringhääling (ERR) organised the nat ...

'' and later in '' Eesti Laul 2016''. She also competed in Eesti Laul 2019 and in Eesti Laul 2022 in a duet with Andrei Zevakin.

Early life

Grete Paia was born on 27 August 1995 in

Kuressaare Kuressaare () is a town on Saaremaa island in Estonia. It is the administrative centre of Saaremaa Parish and the capital of Saare County. Kuressaare is the westernmost town in Estonia. The recorded population on 1 January 2018 was 13,276. Th ...

Estonia Estonia, formally the Republic of Estonia, is a country by the Baltic Sea in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, a ...

on the island of

Saaremaa Saaremaa is the largest island in Estonia, measuring . The main island of Saare County, it is located in the Baltic Sea, south of Hiiumaa island and west of Muhu island, and belongs to the West Estonian Archipelago. The capital of the island i ...

. She attended Kuressaare Gymnasium (Kuressaare Gümnaasium).

Career

On 13 December 2012, Paia was announced as one of the twenty finalists for

with her

Estonian language Estonian ( ) is a Finnic language, written in the Latin script. It is the official language of Estonia and one of the official languages of the European Union, spoken natively by about 1.1 million people; 922,000 people in Estonia and 160,0 ...

song "Päästke noored hinged" (Save the souls of the young). She competed in the first semi-final, held on 16 February 2013 and performed in the seventh position. It was revealed that she was not one of the jury's five qualifiers, placing sixth out of ten, but placed first in the public vote and was able to advance to the final, ending in third place. In the final, held on 2 March 2013, Paia performed in the final position out of ten. She placed fifth with the jury and first with the public and was able to advance to the superfinal, being one of the top two. In the superfinal, she competed against

Birgit Õigemeel Birgit Sarrap (née Õigemeel, born 24 September 1988), also known as simply Birgit, is an Estonian singer. Õigemeel rose to prominence in 2007 after winning the Eesti otsib superstaari (season 1), first season of ''Eesti otsib superstaari'', ...

and her song "

Et uus saaks alguse Estonia participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 2013 with the song "Et uus saaks alguse" written by Mihkel Mattisen and Silvia Soro. The song was performed by Birgit. The Estonian broadcaster Eesti Rahvusringhääling (ERR) organised the nat ...

". She lost in the public vote-only superfinal, and placed second behind the winner, Õigemeel. On 5 November 2015, it was announced that Paia would return to ''Eesti Laul 2016'' with a song called "Stories Untold". She finished 7th place in the final. On 1 December 2018, it was announced that Paia would participate in Eesti Laul 2019 with her song "Kui isegi kaotan". The song failed to qualify, as despite it finishing in the top 6 in the semi it was not in the top 4 in the jury ranking, nor did it receive enough televotes in the second round of voting. Paia is competing in Eesti Laul 2022 as a feature artist on Andrei Zevakin's song "Mis nüüd saab", so far they have progressed to the semi final round after qualifying through the televote.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Paia, Grete Living people 1995 births People from Kuressaare 21st-century Estonian women singers Estonian songwriters Estonian pop singers Eesti Laul contestants