Anni-Frid Lyngstad
Anni-Frid Synni Lyngstad, better known simply as Frida, was born November 15, 1945 in Ballangen outside of Narvik, Norway. Her father was Alfred Haase, a German soldier, and her mother, Synni Lyngstad, was a Norwegian teenage girl. Frida’s father left Norway before Frida was born, and was thought to have vanished when his ship was sunk on the way back to Germany.
18 months after Frida’s birth she moved to Sweden with her grandmother, Agny. Synni soon joined them, but tragically, less than two years after Frida was born, her mother died. Frida grew up with her grandmother in Torshälla, just outside of the town of Eskilstuna.
At the age of 11 she made her stage debut at a Red Cross charity event. Two years later, she started working as an underage vocalist in a dance band, and performed with different bands for a decade. She met her first husband, Ragnar Fredriksson, in 1961. Together they had two children: Hans, born in 1963, and Lise-Lotte, born in 1967.
On September 3, 1967, Frida won a talent contest in Stockholm. Immediately after her victory she appeared on national television singing her winning song. Soon afterwards Frida signed to EMI records.
Frida didn’t have much commercial success as a recording artist up to the early Seventies, but she was a fairly well-known stage artist. In 1970 she was part of a cabaret show together with her fiancé, Benny Andersson, along with Björn Ulvaeus and his fiancée, Agnetha Fältskog.
From 1972 and for the next decade Frida was mainly occupied by her work with ABBA, although she released the Swedish-language solo album Frida ensam (”Frida Alone”) in 1975. During the ABBA years, Frida was also reunited with her father, Alfred Haase, with whom she got in touch through the German pop magazine Bravo.
In February 1982 Frida started recording her first English language solo album Something’s Going On, produced by Phil Collins. This was followed by the 1984 album Shine, produced by Steve Lillywhite. But then Frida withdrew from the public for a number of years. In the early 1990s she devoted most of her time to environmental issues, but in 1996 she made a comeback with the Swedish language album Djupa andetag (”Deep Breaths”). This remains Frida’s latest solo album so far.
In 2005 her albums for Polar Music (Frida ensam, Something’s Going On and Shine) were re-released with bonus tracks. Along with an expanded edition of Djupa andetag, the albums were also included in the box set Frida 4xCD 1xDVD, which featured a DVD of promo clips, television appearances and a brand new interview with Frida.
Today, she leads a low key life, devoting herself to charity work. However, Frida has guested on records by other artists, for example Ratata (Så länge vi har varann), Filippa Giordano (La Bacarolle), Dan Daniell (Lieber Gott and 1895) and Jon Lord (The Sun Will Shine Again). Her latest recording is a new Spanish version of Andante, Andante together with Arturo Sandoval, which appeared on his album “Ultimate Duets” in 2018.
