Bjorn Ulvaeus

Björn Ulvaeus (2013)

Björn Kristian Ulvaeus (born April 25, 1945 in Gothenburg ) is a Swedish musician , songwriter and record producer . He was a member of the Swedish pop group ABBA .

Career

Ulvaeus grew up in the small town of Västervik in southeast Sweden , where his parents Gunnar and Aina Ulvaeus moved when he was six years old. There he attended high school until 1964. Since 1961 he was the guitarist of a folk band called The Partners, which in 1963 changed its name to West Bay Singers. In the same year they were signed by Stikkan Anderson as the first band under his label Polar Music , shortly afterwards they were renamed Hootenanny Singers .

In June 1966 he met Benny Andersson , a member of the Hep Stars then known in Sweden . Ulvaeus had just started law to study, than with a tour of the guitarist of the Hep Stars failed. Ulvaeus dropped out of college and concentrated on music. The two became close friends and fellow musicians. Their friendship and musical collaboration continue to this day, and they are considered to be one of the most important songwriting duos in pop and rock music of the 20th century.

After the victory of the group ABBA at the Eurovision Song Contest 1974 in Brighton with the song Waterloo , Ulvaeus had great musical and commercial success worldwide together with his wife, the singer Agnetha Fältskog , as well as Andersson and his partner Anni-Frid Lyngstad . To date, an estimated 380 million ABBA records have been sold worldwide. The lyrics of the songs by ABBA are largely from Björn Ulvaeus.

After separating from ABBA, Ulvaeus and Andersson began writing the musical Chess with Tim Rice in 1983 , which premiered in London's West End in 1986 and on Broadway in 1988 . In 1995 the musical Kristina från Duvemåla, composed by Ulvaeus and Andersson, premiered in Malmö and was a great success there. Ulvaeus' next project was the production of the musical Mamma Mia , which premiered in London in 1999 and has since been performed successfully in many other cities around the world. The musical is based on ABBA's most successful hits and was filmed in 2008 .

The ABBA Museum has been in Stockholm since May 2013 . Björn Ulvaeus made decisive contributions to the conception and financing of the project. Ulvaeus worked with Benny Andersson on the CD version of their latest musical production Hjälp sökes , which premiered on February 8, 2013 in Stockholm; the CD was released in September 2013. In 2015 Rolling Stone listed him, together with Andersson, at 100 of the 100 best songwriters of all time .

Again with Benny Andersson, Ulvaeus wants to bring the show Pippi på cirkus (Pippi in the circus) to the stage from June 26 to the end of August 2020 in the Stockholm event house Cirkus as a mixture of musical and circus show. The piece, in which Pippi Longstocking goes to the circus with Tommy and Annika and there meets circus princess Miss Carmencita, tightrope walker Elvira and the world's strongest man Adolf, is to be released for the 75th anniversary of the publication of Astrid Lindgren's first work by Longstocking . Ulvaeus once described this as “a real Emil”, referring to “ Michel from Lönneberga ”, which is called “Emil” in the Swedish original.

At the end of May 2020, Ulvaeus was elected President of the CISAC copyright association for three years . The association advocates fair remuneration for composers and authors.

Private life

Björn Ulvaeus villa "Vågaskär" in Djursholm (2013)

In 1969 Ulvaeus met the singer Agnetha Fältskog. They married in 1971 in the southern Swedish village of Verum. They have two children together: Linda (* 1973) and Peter Christian (* 1977). At the end of 1978, Fältskog and Ulvaeus separated; in July 1980 they were divorced. Professionally, however, they continued to work together until ABBA was dissolved at the end of 1982.

Ulvaeus has been married to Lena Källersjö since 1981, with whom he has two daughters, who were born in 1982 and 1986. In the 1980s they lived for six years on a country estate in England , where Ulvaeus ran a computer company with his brother. Since 1990 the family has lived in Stockholm again and in a holiday villa on the island of Viggsö .

Ulvaeus is an atheist and has been a member of the Swedish Humanist Association Humanisterna since 2005 , which is part of the International Humanist and Ethical Union . In 2006 he was awarded the Hedenius Prize by the association for his humanistic commitment .

Others

In a video message that the newspaper Svenska Dagbladet published online on October 4, 2019, Ulvaeus defended climate activist Greta Thunberg against critics: Even if you don't have to agree with everything she says or does, you have to have her courage and hers Admire determination. Thunberg is "like a defiant and deeply thoughtful Pippi Longstocking ". Mature people who criticize the appearance of a child probably lack counter-arguments.

Web links

Commons : Björn Ulvaeus  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Björn Ulvaeus in the Internet Movie Database (English)
• Interview with ABBAs Björn: “Life is more important than all the money in the world” by Radio Bayern 1 on February 15, 2012

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Ödmjuk Bjorn Ulvaeus i exclusively VT intervju. vt.se, accessed February 16, 2013 (Swedish). 
2. ↑ Carl Magnus Palm: Light and Shadow. ABBA - The true story Bosworth 2006, p. 25 f.
3. ↑ Hootenanny Singers. radionostalgi.se, archived from the original on March 31, 2013 ; Retrieved February 16, 2013 (Swedish). 
4. ↑ Benny: Abba nra inte finnas - om Björn pluggat. aftonbladet.se, accessed February 17, 2013 (Swedish). 
5. ↑ ^{a b} ABBA sprack men B: na bär. aftonbladet.se, accessed February 17, 2013 (Swedish). 
6. ↑ Martin Scholz: Abba singer promises reunification . Die Welt, November 10, 2013
7. ↑ Chess for a ny generation. sv.opera.se, accessed February 18, 2013 (Swedish). 
8. ↑ Gothenburg förhandlar om Kristina från Duvemåla. sverigesradio.se, accessed February 18, 2013 (Swedish). 
9. ↑ spiegel.de: New Abba Museum
10. ↑ The 100 Greatest Songwriters of All Time. Rolling Stone , August 2015, accessed August 7, 2017 . 
11. ↑ ABBA icon Ulvaeus brings Pippi Longstocking to circus orf.at, 24./25. November 2019, accessed November 25, 2019.
12. ↑ Ulvaeus new President of Copyright Association , Wiener Zeitung, May 29, 2020.
13. ↑ ^{a b} Agnetha Fältskog. agnetha.net, accessed February 17, 2013 (Swedish). 
14. ↑ Intervju med Agnetha Fältskog - en blyg superstjärna. sverigesradio.se, accessed February 17, 2013 (Swedish). 
15. ↑ Abba singer Agnetha: Blond man's dream with fear of flying. focus.de, accessed on February 19, 2013 . 
16. ↑ Ateisten som finner ro i kyrkan. dn.se, accessed February 19, 2013 (Swedish). 
17. ↑ International. humanisterna.se, accessed February 19, 2013 (Swedish). 
18. ↑ Humanister organiseras i Borås ( Memento from April 18, 2013 in the web archive archive.today )
19. ↑ Fiona Lorenz : AHA! Humanists , Humanistic Press Service , June 22, 2012
20. ↑ ABBA icon Ulvaeus: Thunberg like "Pippi Longstocking" orf.at, October 5, 2019, accessed October 5, 2019.