My first and greatest hit,"Är det konstigt
att man längtar bort nån gång"?("I'm gonna
be a countrygirl again" is the original title.)
And the B-side "Jag ville jag vore".
(I wish I were).
Here I'm singing "Fernando"in German television 1976
Here I'm singing two songs from a live recording
from a Swedish radio broadcast in August of 2010.
I have made a "film" to both songs.First "Amazing
Grace/My Chains are gone".
And here is "I will not
be shaken".
Here are some pictures from way back when..
I made about $1300 per performance which
made headlines. A lot of money back then,
and especially for a 16 year old...
Early newspaper picture from the spring
of -71. Mom and dad in the background.
I'm signing my first album in a
record store.
I got to do the famous LUX soap add.
"9 moviestars out of 10" was the slogan.
Photographer and hairdresser came from
New York. They paid me well plus they
sent me soap for years and years.
I did so much TV in the 70's. I think
about 25 appearances only the first year.
Unfortunately we didn't have home video
back then so I don't have any of it captured.
I have some VHS from the 80's though that I
will try and have transferred so I can post it
eventually.
Lena Andersson Hubbard
There will be more music here eventually.
My thought to start with was to just update
my website a little bit. But when I got to this
page that I call, My music, I have found myself
going through old pictures, magazines and my
memory, and I feel like I'm documenting my
whole life. Maybe it's my age; time to write
"memoires". I don't know if it's interesting
to you, but it's been fun for me to try to
remember.Unfortunately I don't have pictures
of everything, but I have tried to remember
as much as possible.
The 2000's for me so far has been dominated
by me getting married and moving to the US and
California.My last year in Sweden I did a lot
of concerts with the New Orleans inspired
Nissan Jazzband.Christmas concert, church
concert, jazzfestival. Magnus Eklöf was part
of some of this too.Our Christmas concert
was totally sold out and we had a great time.
I also did the very popular TV show "Så ska
det låta" that was broadcasted in 2000.
Me and Nissan Jazzband. Needless to say,
I'm singing gospel.
Here with the crew in "Så ska det låta".
I started to sing right away in my first
church in California. It was called New
Venture Christian Fellowship and is a
great mix of all colors. The pastor is
black, his wife white. We sang a lot of
funky gospel and I sang a lot of solos
with the choir. Here's a sample from
Easter Sunrise Service at the beach
in Oceanside. We had about 7000 in the
audience. Great band!
Pictures from New Venture. Lester Abrams
on keyboard wrote one of the Doobie Brothers
great hits.
The last 4 years we have belonged to Crossroads
Church in Turlock. I have sung solo many times.
Last fall, (2010), I had a chance to do a concert
with musicians from our church at a Women's Retreat
at Mission Springs close to Santa Cruz.It was very
much appreciated and enjoyable for me to get some
space to sing and testify about my faith. Fun!
hejhej
The German cover for "Fernando", two pictures
from concert in East Germany 1974 plus
hand out photo from the same year.
A big event in my life was when I 17
years old, 1972, got to go to Tokyo to
sing and compete at the "Tokyo Music festival".
Artists came from all over the world and
I sang Bjorn and Benny's song "Better to
have loved" that was written for me.
Surprisingly, the song won first prize.
Here I am surrounded by Rick Springfield,Gerard Manuel,
Julio Iglesias, Ike Cole among others.
Stig Andersson, Gerard Manuel, Don Costa and me.
Here I am singing "Better to have
loved" live on Japanese TV.
Here you can listen to the Swedish version
of the song that I sang.First "Cecilia" and
then "Säj det med en sång" or "Better to have loved"
as it's called in English. Both songs written
by Björn and Benny.
I had a cold and couldn't do my very best at the
rehearsal. My manager Stig Andersson wasn't happy....
Stig and me with our prizes. We won anyhow!
Several of us artists performed outdoors in a park.
Everybody thought I was so brave, singing live with
just the guitar.=:-)
I'm doing sightseeing in Tokyo.
My Japanese album release with two of the songs
in Japanese(!).
I participated in what's called the Melodyfestival
in 1972, (the winner gets to go to the Eurovision
song contest), with the same song as in Tokyo. Here
are Stig,Bjorn and Benny in the audience.
Me, Bjorn and Benny in the studio.
I was nominated for a Grammy for the best
debut of the year.Here me with Benny Andersson,
Stig Andersson and Lee Hazelwood at the
Grammy Awards.
My first album sold gold.
I sang with a lot of different musiscians
in the 80's. More acoustic and I think I
tried to find my way back to my roots.
A guitarplayer named Lars Finberg and I
wrote songs together for a while and released
two singles under the name Kiss&Run.
I performed one of our songs called "Tonight"
in a TV show hosted by ABBA Frida.
Here I am with some of the other artists in
the show. Bjorn Skifs,(sang Hooked on a feeling,
#1 in the US with Blue Suede),Frida, me, Clabbe,
(he was the sound engineer on the ABBA tour), and
Pugh Rogefelt.
Here a picture from Club Alexandra in
Stockholm plus a picture of me Lars Finberg
and Lalla Hansson.
I even worked with piano player Slim
Notini for several years and often with
his whole Bluesband. After I got saved
in -85 I even sang gospel with his band.
Full trottle with 3 piece brass section!
Here with Slims band at the steamboat
Blidösund 1987.I got to pray with Slim
to salvation after a gig at Mosebacke
in Stockholm. He later recorded a Christian
CD as a result of that. Slim was a good friend
and a family man.Great to work with and he
always had young, fresh musicians and singers
that he played with.Slim often get to play with
famous american, many times black, artists that
come to Sweden. He loves Fats Domino and likes
to play the piano like him.
Another musician that I worked a lot with
was the guitar player Lill-Hasse Jonsson.
We had gigs all around Sweden.
TV summershow from the Royal
Animal Garden.
Picture from Benny Andersson's all
time choir from the recording of
one of his songs in the Berwald
Hall with full symphony orchestra
in -87.Benny pulled together every
female singer in Sweden he could
think of.I'm standing next to Frida.
After I got saved, I started to
sing gospel. Here I'm at a festival
in Oskarshamn with Slim Notini plus
picture from a concert in a church
outside Sthlm with Lars "Tarzan"
Gustavsson and Tobbe Frisk.
The 90's consisted of singing at Crusades,
conferences and even out in the streets.
Here are some of the countries I visited;
Madrid/Spain,Albania, Moscow/Russia, Slovakia,
the Tjech Republic,Serbia, Hungary, Bulgaria,
Romania and Greece.With Word of Life I for
example went on a 5 week crusade on the
Donaub river.We had large meetings in every
capital along the way and we visited 6 different
countries.We started in Wienna and finished in
Romania.Pastor Ulf Ekman and Bengt Wedemalm
were preaching and I sang solos plus with the
choir.We came to Serbia when the war was more
or less over and the country was still under
embargo.The inflation was enormous and the
streets of Belgrade were full of useless money.
Paper bills thrown everywhere.When we went to
the store,(that hardly had anything on their
shelves),and tried to buy something, we would
get more coins back than we could carry almost.
I still have a couple of notes in the millions
that I kept.We went by steamship all the way and
were told to look out for snipers. Especially
at night.They said there were some guys out there
that had gone crazy from the war.We had wonderful
crusades and we felt that we were encouraging
the people everywhere we went.
Here I'm singing on the streets of Madrid 1992.
I went to Albania with Word of Life and
preacher Bengt Wedemalm. You weren't allowed
to preach officially so we "flew under the
radar" and used my name on the posters, saying
that I had sung with ABBA and called it
gospel concerts. Thank you ABBA! We
visited every city in Albania with
no problem. I have a poster that I will
try and find...
I sang solo a lot at the meetings and
conferences at Word of Life during the years
I lived in Uppsala.(93-97)
Here I'm singing "He's coming back" with the
Word of Life choir and orchestra.I made a
"film" to go with it.
Here at the Vaksala square with Word of Life
in Uppsala and from the square of
Oskarshamn.
I sang at the folkfestival of Västervik in 1995 plus
at the pop group Gyllene Tider's 15 year jubilee,
(invited by Per Gessle,the male singer in Roxette,
"Dressed for Succeess").
We had 15000 in the audience at the main sguare in Halmstad.
The winter of 97-98 I went to Athens,Greece
and stayed there for 6 months. I was leading
the worship, (in Greek!!), at a small
Word of Life church, started by Urban
Wickstrom right in the center of Athens.
Very exciting experience and I think it
was there I seriously started to consider
living abroad.
After I had moved down to Västervik,(97),
and later Oskarshamn,(99), I started to
work with piano player Magnus Eklöf. He is
a very versified and good jazz/blues/gospel
player.We had a lot of engagements during
my 4 years down there.
Me and Magnus.
I have never stopped singing though, only the summertours,
Swedish style were over after 10 years.I have kept on
singing through the 80's, 90's and the 2000's.
Here is a picture from one of my very first engagements
in the spring of -71. My dad drove me there.(Some pictures
are scanned from newpapers and unfortunaly the quality
isn't that good.)
I did my TV debut in April 1971 in a show called Hylands
Corner, a type of Ed Sullivan show..Since I was under 16
I had to sing in the early afternoon show. I turned 16
on the 11th of April, but rules had to be followed.
The whole country was watching and the next day I was
front page news and a "star was born".I sang the song
that became my greatest hit,a Swedish cover version of
"I'm gonna be a country girl again" with the legendary
studio orchestra. I also sang "Scarborough Fair" playing
the guitar and with guitarrist Georg Wadenius,
(leadguitarist in Blood, Sweat and Tears, 72-75),
playing with me.
It was such a great advantage for me that my hometown
Halmstad,was nominated "the City of the Year" by the
biggest evening newspaper, (Expressen), that same year.
This meant that I got a lot of extra publicity through them.
They wanted me to succeed.Here a picture of me and Hyland,
the host for the TV show, at a celebration in my hometown
for that same reason.
My first summertour in 1971 I traveled with the group
"Visavi".It was all guitars,upright base and no drums.
I played the guitar with one foot up on a stool.Here
we are playing at the Main Stage at Gröna Lund, Stockholm's
main amusement park and flowers backstage.
This picture is from the Folkfestival in Västervik 1971.
In 1972 I toured with Ted Gärdestad. A very promising
new talent. He was one year younger than me and this
was my second summer and his first. He was discovered
by Bjorn and Benny and we were both at Polar Music.
I did another show this year at a famous showplace in
Malmoe together with Bengt Sändh, Bosse Parnevik and Ingmar
Nordström's orchestra. Lasse Holmqvist, a famous TV
personality was hosting the show.There were a lot of
fun and practical jokes going around. At one time
Bosse Parnevik, (he's a comedian and impersonater and
actually the dad of golf player Jesper),wanted to take
me to the musical "Annie get your gun" that was playing
in Malmoe at the time. Being a gentleman,and a funny
guy, he wanted to ask my parents for permission when
they came down to see the show.He totally dropped his
chin when he came to the table where they were seated
and realized that my parents were just a couple of years
older than him. I was so young!Only 17!It was all very
innocent but we thought that was so funny! Did we go?
Yes, we did.
The spring of -72 I went to Tokyo which I have
told about already, and in the spring of -73
I went to Caracas, Venezuela together with
my manager Stig Andersson and Annifrid Frida
Lyngstad. This was before ABBA and Frida and I
competed with two diffrent songs. All songs
had to go in a special, new rhytm, a kind
of Bossa Nova. We performed at a theatre
three nights and everything was broadcasted
live on TV. One evening everything had to be
stopped because one of the aspiring top
politicians was in the audience. Those in favor
started to fight with those against.People
were hanging down from the balconys.Very
unswedish indeed!:-)
Sang in Åre,(skiresort, hosts World Cup Slalom), at Grand Hotel
accompanied by the band Solar Plexus. Had a lot of fun
with keyboard player Monica Dominique.Singer Tommy Körberg
was in his most progressive fase and wanted everybody up
on the tiny little stage. I wanted to sing from the
dance floor which I did.It was an honor to sing with
such a great band.
I absolutely don't remember everything I've done.
But I'm trying!! :-)
Germany
I also went to Berlin this year and did a TV show
called "Schwedenmädel" which means Swedish gals. We were
seven famous Swedish singers, Lill-Babs, Sylvia Vrethammar,
Titti Sjöblom, Lill Lindfors, (or Die Lindfors as they
called her), Nina Lizell, Bibi Johns and myself.
I don't look to happy in this picture, but we had
a lot of fun actually. I was always so much younger
than everybody else, and that was hard sometimes.
I didn't have the distance needed that maturity
brings. I have no memory of what I sang though.
All I remember was shooting some kind of scene up
in the TV tower of Berlin.
I recorded three of ABBA's gretest hits for the
German market in German and with their original
backgrounds. The songs were "Fernando","SOS" and
"Hasta Manana".I don't remember all of the
recordings but I know that I went to Berlin
for one of them.Probably "Fernando". I went
down there all by myself and I was surrounded
by Germans and the German language for a couple
of weeks.I remember sitting on the Allitalia flight
back home wondering what language the people in
front of me were speaking. It took me a long time
before I realized they were speaking Swedish!!
I had been soaked in German and German frases
were flying around in my head. At the same
occasion I recorded for the TV show "Hitparade"
that you can watch if you go over to the left.
Another time my record company sent me to
Germany for a promotion tour. I think 75 or
76. Again, I was all by myself, traveling
from city to city, meeting with different
record company people that had different ideas
how to promote me. At one place this woman had
this "brilliant" idea that I would open the door
of this armoire, find a troll in there and look
very surprised. That was her photo shoot idea.
Every fiber in my being hated this, in my opinion
very silly idea, but she tried to force me and made
me feel difficult because I didn't like it. Finally,
I broke down and cried. I felt totally left out to
this stranger and I hated the whole situation.
Another memory from this tour is when I all alone as the
only woman sitting by myself at a restaurant in Baden-Baden,
feel like everybody is looking and wondering what I'm
doing there.Many times I wonder what they were thinking
sending me on trips like this all by myself. It was tough
and it was hard trying to be at my advantage,
surrounded by nothing but strangers.
I made some money from these recordings though. Don't know
how much in total, but I remember one time in the
70's when two checks of a total of about $8000 came
through my mailbox. That was a nice surprise!
I think the cover of "Fernando" looks great, but
the German photographer was not a very nice man.
Just some inside information.
Here you can listen to both "SOS" and "Hasta Manana"
that were released together.Go to the left of the page
to listen to "Fernando" on German TV.
The summer of 1973 I toured with the group
"Landslaget", (which in Swedish means the
National team).They played a kind of rocky
folkmusic style. The girl in the band ,
Maj-Britt for example played electrified violin.
Just to give you an idea.Maj-Britt, (now a painting
artist),and I are still good friends. One of the band
members became a great producer, another one head of
Warner Brothers in Sweden.They had a big blue bus
with tables and beds in the back. It was cool!
In 1974 it was time for Tomas Ledin on the
scene....He later became one of our most popular
male singers and have had a lot of hits.Jerry
Williams were our choreographer. Oooops!
I made 4 different tours in 1974.I did something called
"the Fashion Parade" arranged by one of the leading
ladies magazines.We travelled from city to city, put
on a musical show and were fashion models at the same
time.It was me, a Swedish band called Sten & Stanley and
Adele Lipuma.In the fall I went with the same band to
East Germany where we played in theatres in 14 different
cities. The other artists were James Hollongworth and
Karin Ljungman. This was before the Iron Curtain came down
and we experienced some of the oppression and depression
that was prevalent.The censur department came to our
opening night to make sure we didn't say or sing anything
against the regime.We were about 15 people that made about
$2500 each.It was all in East German currency and we weren't
allowed to bring any money out, so we had to find things to
buy and bring home.I think this experience cured me from
"shopping". In every new city, we all got an haunting expression
in our eyes and we all disappeared in different directions.
It was hard to find something to buy in the eastern countries
in those days.Believe me! They had a quota. If three of us
came in to the same store to buy a camera, only one of us
were allowed to buy one that week! The nice thing was that we
could all afford to buy everybody dinner for example. Nice!
An unforgettable experience!
I went with the Field artists to Cairo and the Sinai desert
in the spring of 74 together with Titti Sjöblom, Staffan Broms and
Leppe Sundevall. We were all leutenants and wore uniforms. We
were the first "civilianz" to cross the Suez canal directly
after the war between Israel and Egypt.The desert were full
of airplane parts and even dead paratroopers.We were singing
along the Gaza strip for soldiers in tents.In 1975 I went back
again. This time we came through Israel. The other artists
were Brita Borg, Allan Johansson and Tosse Bark. Flickery
Flies, in other words.
In 1975 I toured with Lalla Hansson for the first time.We
did altogether 5 years in the Swedish Folkparks and we had
gigs all around the year at clubs etc. We were also a couple
for about 4 years.
Lalla and me at Skansen.
Here I am singing at the Greek island Rhodes with
Sven-Erik Magnusson and Hansi Schwarz in 1975.
Lalla and I made some trips as for example to a
music festival in Istanbul where we sang.Experinced
some interesting cultural phenomenon. We were openly
told that to win, we had to bribe the judges.There
was a filmfestival going on at the same time and
we hung out with the Swedish film team.
Here we are with some Swedish actors and one film
director;Kjelle Bergqvist, Ted Åström and Pelle Berglund.
1977 I toured with ABBA on their first world wide tour.
I did the backing vocal. ABBA was super big in Australia
already, but in Sweden at that time they were given a rather
lukewarm reception.When the press got the news that I was
going to sing with ABBA they couldn't understand how I,being
a solo artist myself could sing with them. Now I'm proud
of course to be associated with ABBA and here in the US
it's a big deal for people to learn that I used to sing
with them, and that I even had Bjorn and Benny as my
producers.The other two singers were Lena-Maria Gårdenäs
and Maritza Horn. The tour started in Oslo, Norway, Copenhagen
and went around in Germany, Holland, England and Scotland.
After a couple of weeks brake, we went on to Australia where
we performed in Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth.
"ABBA the Movie" was made in Australia from our concerts there.
With the Swedish film team we were about 150 people on the tour.
Lasse Hallstrom,("My life as a dog", "Chocolat","The Cider House
Rules"etc.),directed the movie.
Two videos from Australia and ABBA the movie: First, the
Carousel where we in the choir can be heard a little extra.
Trailer for the movie.
Here are some private pictures from Australia that I took.
