Alexandra Stan

Alexandra Ioana Stan (born 10 June 1989 in Constanța) is a Romanian singer. Her career began in 2009 when native music producers Marcel Prodan and Andrei Nemirschi heard her singing at a Karaoke bar and proposed her a contract with their own management, Maan Studio. She subsequently released her debut recording "Lollipop (Param Pam Pam)" in late 2009. The song and its video were met with bad reviews, being criticised for their eroticism. Her next single, "Mr. Saxobeat", was composed by Marcel Prodan and Andrei Nemirschi, the duo that discovered her at the Mamaia Music Festival. It became her worldwide breakthrough hit, selling 1,000,000 copies in less than a year. The single went to number one in a total of nine countries and reached the top ten in over thirty countries, such as New Zealand, the United Kingdom and Australia. It became a top-thirty hit in Canada and the United States. She released her debut album in August 2011, entitled Saxobeats, which reached the top thirty album charts in several European countries, including Germany, Austria and Finland. The record spawns her next single "Get Back (ASAP)", which gained success in several more countries, notably in Romania, Finland and France.

Mr. Saxobeat

"Mr. Saxobeat" is a song recorded by Romanian singer Alexandra Stan for her debut studio album, Saxobeats (2011). It was written and produced by Romanian production duo Marcel Prodan and Andrei Nemirschi. Lyrically, the song features a love message, where Stan speaks of a man she is attracted to, and the way he makes her move. The track was firstly released on January 28, 2011 through ARS and Ego Records in Sweden and Italy, respectively. "Mr. Saxobeat" is mainly an Eurodance recording, with it also containing elements of house music.

It shortly became a global hit. It spent eight consecutive weeks at number one in Romania before expanding to Spain, France and Belgium, becoming a top five in most countries across Europe, including making it to number-one in at least ten charts. It has then entered the top thirty of the Canadian Hot 100 and ultimately on the Billboard Hot 100. Following this, it entered the top five in New Zealand and the top twenty in Australia.

An accompanying music video was shot in MediaPro Studios, Buftea in order to promote the song. It shows Stan being arrested, thrown in jail, and seducing a guard to escape. The song was also the first million-selling single in Romania.

-stan

The suffix -stan (Persian: ـستان‎‎ -stān) is Persian for "place of" or "country". It appears in the names of many regions, especially in Central and South Asia, but also in the Caucasus and Russia; areas where significant amounts of Persian culture were spread or adopted. The suffix is also used more generally, as in Persian and Urdu rigestân (ریگستان) "place of sand, desert", Pakistan "land of the pure", Hindustan "land of the Hindus", golestan (گلستان) "place of flowers, garden", etc.

Etymology and cognates

The suffix, originally an independent noun, but evolving into a suffix by virtue of appearing frequently as the last part in nominal compounds, is of Indo-Iranian and ultimately Indo-European origin: It is cognate with Sanskrit sthā́na (Devanagari: स्थान [st̪ʰaːna]), meaning "the act of standing", from which many further meanings derive, including "place, location", and ultimately descends from Proto-Indo-Iranian *sthāna-.

The Proto-Indo-European root from which this noun is derived is *steh₂- (older reconstruction *stā-) "to stand" (or "to stand up, to step (somewhere), to position (oneself)"), which is also the source of English to stand, Latin stāre, and Ancient Greek histamai (ἵσταμαι), all meaning "to stand" and Russian стан (stan, meaning "settlement" or "semi-permanent camp"). In Polish and Ukrainian, stan means "state" or "condition", while in Serbo-Croatian it translates as "apartment" (a Slovenian word "stanovanje" means apartment or other closed space of living is an obvious derivative of stan) in its modern usage, while its original meaning was "habitat". In Czech and Slovak, it means "tent" or, in military terms, "headquarters". Also in Germanic languages, the root can be found in Stand ("place, location"), and in Stadt (German), stad/sted (Dutch/Scandinavian), stêd (West Frisian) and stead (English), all meaning either "place" or "city". The suffix -stan is analogous to the suffix -land, present in many country and location names.

Stan!

Stan! (born Steven Brown on 16 October 1964 in Brooklyn, New York City, United States) is an American author, cartoonist, and game designer. He is sometimes credited as Stan Brown.

Biography

Brown was born and grew up on Long Island and attended Binghamton University. Brown began publishing fiction, cartoons, and games professionally in 1982, usually under the pen name "Stan!." He is the author of numerous short stories, novels, roleplaying products, comics and cartoons. He has served as a graphic designer and line editor for West End Games; an editor and game designer for TSR, Inc.; and an author, senior game designer, and creative director for Wizards of the Coast, Inc. He has also been the creative content manager at Upper Deck Entertainment.

In 2007, R. Hyrum Savage formed a subsidiary of his OtherWorld Creations with Brown called Super Genius Games. He has also worked as the creative content manager for Upper Deck Entertainment, and the creative vice president for The Game Mechanics, Inc. Brown is the Creative Director for Super Genius Games. He co-founded The Game Mechanics with JD Wiker, Marc Schmalz, and Rich Redman.

Östanå

Östanå is a village situated in Östra Göinge Municipality, Skåne County, Sweden with 221 inhabitants in 2005.

References