About
Biography
Hovav Sekulets (born in Kiryat Ata in 1986), known by the stage name Hovvi Star, is an Israeli singer, actor, composer, writer, voiceover and presenter.
Hovi studied at the religious youth village, near Kfar Hassidim, until the age of 14. In the 10th grade, he decided to drop out of school in order to release an album, so after this didn’t work out, he returned to school a year later. He did his military service in military bands.
About six months before his release from the IDF, he auditioned for the seventh season of the reality show Kokhav Nolad, and was accepted. After being eliminated from the show in tenth place, he returned to the program using the “Lifebuoy” mechanism, and finally finished in seventh place. Immediately after “Kokhav Nolad”, he participated in “The Children’s Song Festival 2009” with the song “Little boy, big boy”, which he wrote and composed together with Assaf Aberbuch.
On January 29, 2010, he appeared at a fundraise for the victims of the earthquake in Haiti and sang Ilanit’s song “Bashana Nehsah” in his own arrangement. In 2010, he hosted the show “Kokhav Live”, which followed the contestants behind the scenes of “Kokhav Nolad 8”, and at the same time presented a column on Kokhav Nolad in a morning show. In June of that year, he appeared at the opening event of the Pride Week in Tel Aviv.
In 2016, he participated in the reality program HaKokhav HaBa La’Eirovizion. As part of a collaboration with the Israel Broadcasting Authority, the program was designed to select Israel’s representative for Eurovision 2016. Hovi Star won the contest and represented Israel in the Eurovision Song Contest 2016 with the song “Made of Stars”. In the Grand Final of the contest, Hovi reached a 14th place.
Hovi Star played roles in children’s plays “Little mermaid” and “Aladdin”.
On 3 March 2019, Hovi Star made a comeback with a new song, “Silver spoon”. In January 2020 he opened a new YouTube channel called Mr. Star. He published cover versions of songs on the channel. In 2021 he released a new single in Hebrew.
