BUCHAREST: Like dancing and looking for new club music? Move over London and Ibiza, it's time to check out Romania. Artists from this eastern European state have inched their way onto the international scene to beat out Lady Gaga for a big US dance song award, score millions of viewers on YouTube and sell hundreds of thousands of singles. Among the best known are Edward Maya and Inna, now worldwide dance floor stars, and the pride and joy of this former communist country stuck in an economic crisis and still fighting a reputation abroad as corrupt and poor. “Romanian dance music is very successful around the world at the moment with big hits in Europe and the US,” said Eelko van Kooten, director of one of the major dance labels, Dutch-based Spinnin'Records. In May, the 24-year-old Maya won the American Billboard Award for “top dance song” of the year for “Stereo Love”, no small feat for an artist who only caught the public's eye in 2009 and was competing in a line-up that included megastar Lady Gaga. The dark-eyed performer sports his trendy stubble as easily as his accordion, more folk than house music instrument but one he readily uses for a new mix that caught attention. Since the 2009 release of “Stereo Love”, the Bucharest-born composer has won gold and platinum albums from Canada to Spain and toured clubs as far away as India and Pakistan.
