Faegheh Atashin (born 5 May 1950), known professionally as Googoosh, is an Iranian (Azerbeidzjanian) singer and former actress. Regarded as a pop icon, she is one of the most popular and prolific entertainers in Iran, and her career has spanned over six decades. Googoosh has enjoyed significant popularity since the beginning of her career, ultimately becoming a cultural icon inside Iran and abroad.
She is mainly known for her contributions to Iranian pop music, but she also starred in a variety of Persian movies from the 1950s to the 1970s. She achieved the pinnacle of her fame and success towards the end of the 1970s. In the 1970s, Googoosh was widely emulated by Iranian women, as they copied her clothing (miniskirts) and her short haircut (known as the "Googooshi"). Following the 1979 Iranian Revolution, she remained in Tehran until 2000 and did not perform again during that period due to Iran's ban on female singers. Younger generations of Iranians have rediscovered her music via bootleg recordings. After leaving Iran in 2000, she performed a total of 27 concerts in European and North American countries in that year. Recent projects include a new collaboration with Iranian singer-songwriter Hassan Shamaizadeh from her 2012 album Ejaz, as well as serving as head judge and head of academy for the popular reality show Googoosh Music Academy broadcast on London-based satellite channel Manoto 1.
Since her return to the stage in the summer of 2000, she has performed in concerts and venues all around the world, including Madison Square Garden in New York City, the Air Canada Centre in Toronto, the Ericsson Globe in Stockholm, Honda Center in Anaheim, Royal Albert Hall in London and the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles She has recorded songs in many languages including Persian, Azerbaijani, Turkish, English, Spanish, Italian, Arabic, Armenian and French. She has a significant following outside of Iran and has even received the attention of European and African media and press.
Early life
Googoosh was born as Faegheh Atashin on 5 May 1950, in Tehran, Iran to Iranian Azerbaijani parents. She was quickly called "Googoosh", an Armenian name normally exclusively used for boys but which became her stage name. In an interview she noted that she was called Googoosh from a very early age; in her birth certificate however her birth name Faegheh is recorded.
Career Before the Revolution (1953–1979)
Googoosh began her career at a very young age as a singer and dancer working in the stage shows of her father, Saber, a cabaret artist and acrobat. As a child actress, she appeared in several films in the 1960s such as Fear and Hope.
During the 1970s, Googoosh began her recording career and a meteoric rise to fame and success. Known for her flamboyant outfits and fashion sense, Googoosh wowed her pop-culture-hungry fans in Iran and abroad with her trademark hairdos and hip-elegant style, inspiring many Iranian women to copy her hairdos. Her music ranged from upbeat 1960s and 1970s pop, given a traditional-tinged edge, to declamatory, emotional ballads dealing with love and loss, comparable to the chanson style of music by artists like Édith Piaf. Her music was popular among non-Persian-speaking audiences as well. She starred in over 25 movies, one of which was to be the most commercially successful Iranian motion picture of all time. Googoosh performed many times for the royal family and was a favorite of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi's wife and children. She performed at the party given for the 17th birthday of Reza Pahlavi, Crown Prince of Iran.
Revolution and hiatus (1979–2000) At the time of the 1979 Iranian Revolution, Googoosh was in Los Angeles. However, feeling homesick, she decided to return to Iran. In response to why she remained in Iran after the revolution, she said that it was "out of love for her homeland". Despite being a symbol of many things that the revolution tried to overturn, especially related to perceptions of excessive Westernization, Googoosh remained in Iran for years afterward.
The regime imposed a lien on her residence, prevented her from receiving a passport and imprisoned her at one point. After the revolution, Googoosh, like other artists, was forbidden from performing and her material was banned. She did not perform again until Mohammad Khatami's presidency, during which she was allowed to tour outside of the country after obtaining a contract to perform overseas.
Departure from Iran and comeback (2000–present) Googoosh left Iran and went to Canada in 2000, after being in Iran for 21 years following the Iranian Revolution. BMusic's Taghinia, says "Googoosh is the siren of that era [Pre-revolution] and important in that she's really a direct link to Iran's past." Chicago Tribune considers the return of Googoosh to be "more than just a pop milestone" but instead "a cultural marker, a measure of the way change occurs in a society that for more than two decades has tried to resist the tide of globalization by living in self-imposed isolation."
She released her first album after her comeback called Zartosht (Zoroaster) in 2000 with lyrics by Masoud Kimiaei (under the pseudonym Nosrat Farzaneh) and composed and arranged by Babak Amini and Babak Bayat.
In 2000, Googoosh sang in public, away from her homeland, for the first time after 21 years of silence to the acclaim of many long-time fans. The Googoosh Comeback Tour was a series of concerts starting in July 2000. She began with a sold-out concert at the Air Canada Centre in Toronto on 29 July 2000 (with an audience of more than 12,000), and eventually brought the tour to a conclusion in Dubai on 21 and 24 March 2001 on the occasion of the Iranian New Year, Nowruz. Her concert in Dubai was considered a homecoming for her, and out of the more than 20,000 members of the audience, seventy percent of them were Iranians who had crossed the Persian Gulf to hear her. The two Dubai concerts held special importance: it was the tour finale, and Googoosh was rumored to be planning to return to Iran.
In 2000, a feature-length documentary called Googoosh: Iran's Daughter was released which chronicled the singer's life and her icon-status while detailing the socio-political turmoil that led to the 1979 Revolution in Iran. Made by Iranian-American filmmaker Farhad Zamani, the documentary began production in 1998 and was made at a time when Googoosh was still forbidden to give interviews.
Googoosh started collaborating with Mehrdad Asemani with QQ Bang Bang (2003). They continued their collaborating in the albums Akharin Khabar (2004), Manifest (2005) and Shabe Sepid (2008). Most of the lyrics of these albums were by Shahyar Ghanbari.
Beginning in 2011, she served as head-of-academy and head-judge alongside Hooman Khalatbari and Babak Saeedi for the widely popular talent show/singing competition Googoosh Music Academy, which was broadcast on the London-based Iranian satellite channel Manoto 1 and was their most watched program. Googoosh Music Academy lasted three seasons. In December 2010, Googoosh held a very notable concert in the Kurdish region of Iraq, to which tens of thousands of Iranians came from Tehran and beyond.
In 2010, Googoosh ran a Persian talent competition show called Googoosh Music Academy. The series ran in Europe and Middle East on Monoto TV channes.
Googoosh released the album Hajme Sabz (Green X) in 2010. She said: "I have tried to have works from different composers and songwriters in this new album". Googoosh chose the name "Aasheghaaneh" for this album, but because of her interest in the book "Hajme Sabz" (The Green Space) by Sohrab Sepehri, she changed the name of the album. She released her old song Mano Gonjeshkaye Khooneh with a new arrangement by Babak Amini in this album.
In March 2011, Googoosh released a snippet of a new song she was working on, titled Bedrood, via YouTube. In April 2011, she debuted her latest project. The singer launched her own cosmetic collection sold online, titled Googoosh Cosmetics. In April 2011, she held a concert at the Nokia Theatre in Los Angeles, as well as a record breaking performance at the same venue on 27 October 2012, as a part of her worldwide Ejaz Tour. Also on 26 March 2013 she performed at London's Royal Albert Hall for the first time.
In 2012, Googoosh released her 6th studio album since her comeback, titled Ejaz. The album consisted of 10 tracks, featuring collaborations with Hassan Shamaizadeh (Hayahoo) and three songs wherein she collaborated with her fellow Googoosh Music Academy judge Babak Saeedi and with Raha Etemadi (Nagoo Bedrood and Noghteye Payan and Hese Mobham). She also collaborated with Alireza Afkari and Roozbeh Bemani on three songs (E'jaz and Baraye Man and Behesht). Another single Bi Manoto was a musical rendition of a poem by the Persian poet Rumi. The poem came to Googoosh's attention while she was banned from singing at the time of the Iran–Iraq War. She stated that she felt inspired by the lyrics and therefore created her own melody and was finally presented with the opportunity to record it as she had long hoped to do.
In February 2014, she released a music video of the song Behesht, in support of the gay and lesbian community in Iran, which faces significant challenges in its struggle for equal rights, including the ongoing threat of the death penalty for convictions related to sexual orientation. This made her the first prominent Iranian with a huge following to speak out against homophobia in Iran.
In the same year, Googoosh released a joint single with Ebi called Nostalgia. She started a joint world tour with Ebi with the same name, in which each of them sang some solo songs and some songs together.
On 21 March 2015, Googoosh released her 7th album titled Aks-e Khosoosi (Private Portrait) including 11 tracks from different songwriters and composers such as Babak Sahraee, Nickan Ebrahimi, Babak Amini (Googoosh band leader). The first song of this album is Che Ziba Bood, which is also the last song that was composed by Varujan. Googoosh sang the old tasnif Morq-e sahar in this album.
In 2017, Googoosh started a world tour called "The Memory Makers" with Hassan Shamaizadeh and Ardalan Sarfraz. In the Los Angeles concert of this tour, Ardalan Sarfraz could not attend and Martik was present in this concert.
In 2018, Googoosh released a single song in collaboration with Martik called Refaghat, and after positive feedback, she collaborated with Martik in two other songs called Eshghe Kamyab and Asheghet Hastam.
Googoosh released her last album named Twenty One in 2021 with the composition of Siavash Ghomayshi and the lyrics of Raha Etamadi. During production, the trio tested positive for COVID-19.
On 14 September 2023, Googoosh published a video on her official pages in the social media, in which she announced that her new tour (Final Chapter) is her last world tour and a farewell tour.
In 2024, a documentary about Googoosh, featuring her own presence, titled Googoosh – Made of Fire, was released in cinemas in Germany.
She published her memoir called Googoosh: A Sinful Voice on December 2, 2025, co-written with Tara Dehlavi, and the Persian translation of this book, translated by Homa Sarshar, was released on December 10 of the same year. In this book, she revealed for the first time the previously untold parts of her life.
Gogoosh has maintained a prominent and widely recognized reputation in popular culture over the last half century.
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