Romanian folk rock from the LP Aniversare 35 (1997). Phoenix was launched in the cosmopolitan city of Timişoara in 1962 by a pair of schoolboys: Nicu Covaci and Béla Kamocsa, under the name of
Sfinţii (The Saints). In their first years, together with Florin "Moni" Bordeianu (born 1948), they performed in school contests and at local clubs,
covering Western music hits from The Rolling Stones, The Beatles, The Who, etc., and they quickly became very popular amongst the youth. In 1965 the
Communist authorities demanded that the band stop performing under the name The Saints, because of the religious innuendo that the name carried. Forced to comply,
the band took the name Phoenix.In 1970, Moni Bordeianu emigrated to the United States, and, for a brief period of time the band suspended its activity, also due to
total censorship that followed a protesting speech held by Bordeianu in his last concert. The lineup in 1970 was
Nicu Covaci - guitar, Günther "Spitzly" Reininger - piano and voice, Zoltan Covacs - bass guitar and Liviu Butoi - oboe and flute. Phoenix was born again the
next year, with Covaci, Josef Kappl, Mircea Baniciu, Costin Petrescu (replaced in 1974 by Ovidiu Lipan, nicknamed "Ţăndărică") and Valeriu Sepi.
But the Communist officials were not very comfortable with the Western-style music that they were singing, and kept creating them problems. So Phoenix abandoned
beat turned to Romanian folklore, pagan rituals, mystic animals and old traditions. In this same year, Phoenix started a collaboration with the Institute of
Ethnography and Folklore and the Folklore section of Timişoara University on an ambitious project, a rock poem that combined traditional wooden instruments with
modern sounds. By this time, the popularity of Phoenix had grown huge; people loved their songs not only for what they were, but also because they contained
thinly-veiled allusions to the Communist regime. The band members, especially Nicu Covaci, found themselves increasingly harassed by the Security.
Covaci married a Dutch woman and left the country in 1976. He returned in 1977, bringing in relief aid for those struck by the powerful earthquake on March 4.
After two grandiose concerts in Constanţa and Tulcea, Covaci surprisingly left the country again, this time with all the band members (except Baniciu) hidden
inside their Marshall speakers - a huge undertaking, since in Communist Romania it was extremely difficult to obtain approval to travel abroad, and illegal border
crossing was punished with imprisonment. In 1990 Phoenix made a modest comeback to Romania. Despite the fact that they were expected to sing their first song in
their hometown Timişoara, the city that sparked the Romanian Revolution of 1989 that eventually led to the downfall of the Communist regime, their first post-1989
concert took place in Bucharest, the capital of Romania. Phoenix also stopped composing new music and just kept selling compilations of their old
record for over a decade. Internal conflicts, especially between Covaci and Baniciu, were making headlines in the media.
A new album appeared in 2000, the first original album after their 1990 comeback attempt; with the exception of Covaci, the lineup comprised none of the members
from the '70s.
In 2002, the 40th anniversary of the band brought together some of the former members.
At the end of 2005 the band released a new album, named Baba Novak, in its classic gold lineup, but after a while Mircea Baniciu left the band and formed,
together with others, Pasarea Colibri. Today, Phoenix continues to hold live shows.