La Arja (62) has released a new CD "Rakkaus on rohkeutta" (Love is being brave), her first in Finnish since 2000. Multilingual and political artist and United Nation's Goodwill Ambassador, lately she has been moving away from her early days Mikis Theodorakis songs and collaborations with Inti Illimani singing Violetta Parra to Scandinavian schlager, and this one is described as "Schlager ballads". Her first single is from 1969 and album from 1972. Fourteen albums in Finnish, eleven in Swedish and other recordings in Norvegian, Spanish, Italian, French, Greek and German. She has participated twice in Melodifestival: 1987 "Högt över havet" lost with one point and went on to win Second Chance later that year, and "Vad än du trodde så trodde du fel" bombed in 2005. Also twice in Euroviisut: "Talvilintu" in 1971 and "Gabriela" came third in 1990. She has also starred in three Finnish movies and has written a book about the Scandinavian sauna culture. She was also one of the contestants in Swedish TV's "Let's Dance" in 2005-2006 and later posed with her partner in "erotic" photos causing quite a scandal.
She is also a candidate to host Eurovision 2007 if you believe fan forums....
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