Being the richest recording artist in Eastern Europe, Elena Alexandra Apostoleanu, professionally known as INNA, is a Romanian singer, songwriter, dancer, human rights activist and philanthropist. After an unsuccessful audition for the Romanian band A.S.I.A., she was working in an office when her manager heard her singing and contacted the Romanian production trio Play & Win with whom she recorded several songs.

The singer first adopted the stage name Alessandra along with a pop-rock style, and entered two songs to represent Romania at the Eurovision Song Contest 2008, with “Goodbye” and “Sorry”, neither of which were selected. She also had her first TV appearance, performing “Goodbye” live on the primetime TV show Teo!.

Later that year, she changed her stage name to a shorter, easier-to-memorise one, INNA, as her grandfather called her when she was young. Drastically turning her style to a more electronic direction, she released her debut single “Hot”, which became a commercial success worldwide and topped several charts–including Romanian Top 100 and Billboard’s Hot Dance Airplay.

2009 brought INNA’s debut studio album, also titled Hot, an EDM album with influences varying from trance to electro house, techno to Hi-NRG, synth-pop to chillout. Certified platinum, it featured other successful singles in Europe–such as her second number one song in Romania, “Amazing,” “Love,” and the Bob Taylor-assisted hit, “Déjà Vu”. Throughout 2010, alternative versions of the album were released, incomporating hits like “10 Minutes,” and “Un Momento”.

Her second album I Am the Club Rocker, released in 2011, achieved global success for its lead single “Sun Is Up”–which won the Eurodanceweb Award, making INNA the first and only Romanian artist to ever win the award. To back her project, the artist embarked on her Europe & United States I Am the Club Rocker Tour from 2011 to 2012.

She rose to major fame when she became the first European female vocalist to surpass one billion total views on YouTube in February 2012. Her third album Party Never Ends, was released in 2013 and featured her first collaboration with Puerto Rican-rapper Daddy Yankee, “More than Friends”. To support the premiere of the album, INNA released multiple promotional singles, such as “OK,” “Alright,” and “J’adore”.

In 2014, INNA signed with Atlantic Records and released the commercially successful “Cola Song” with Colombian singer J Balvin, which promoted the FIFA 2014 World Cup and was later used in Just Dance 2017. A year later, she released her fourth and eponymous studio album along with a Japanese version of the album, titled Body and the Sun. In 2016, INNA became a member of the supergroup G Girls, with whom she released the singles “Call the Police” and “Milk and Honey”.

In 2017, her YouTube channel surpassed two billion total views and her fifth record, Nirvana, was released in partnership with supermarket chain Lidl.

2018 marked her signature on Jay Z’s label, Roc Nation, and in 2019, she released her sixth studio album Yo, an experimental and heavily gypsy music-influenced effort. A strong departure from her previous EDM-oriented style, it features only Spanish language material and marks the first time the artist has full creative control over her album.

INNA has received several awards and nominations, including an European Border Breakers Award, five Balkan Music Awards and three MTV Europe Music Awards for Best Romanian Act. She has been called “one of Romania’s biggest exports” by The Guardian.