Anni-Frid Lyngstad

Anni-Frid-Synni "Frida" Lyngstad, now Her Highness The Princess Reuss of Plauen (Anni-Frid Prinzessin Reuss von Plauen) (born November 15, 1945) is best known as one of the four members of the Swedish pop group ABBA. She is of German and Norwegian origin.

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Anni-Frid was born illegitimately in Ballangen, near Narvik, Norway as a result of a liaison between Synni – her mother – and a married German sergeant, Alfred Haase, during the German military occupation. Anni-Frid believed that her father had died when his ship to Germany was sunk during the war. After a German magazine published the story of her origins in 1977, Anni-Frid discovered that her father had not died.

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At the end of WWII Anni-Frid, her mother and grandmother fled to Sweden for fear of reprisals from the Norwegian population – whose government did little to stop the injustice against many German-fathered children (several were placed into mental institutions, children's homes or sent overseas). Synni died before Anni-Frid was two, so she was brought up by her grandmother in Eskilstuna, Sweden.

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Anni-Frid got her first job as a jazz singer in 1958, at the age of 13, then formed her own band, the Anni-Frid Four, marrying the bass player Ragnar Fredriksson in 1963, at age 18, with whom she had two children before divorcing.

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In 1967 Anni-Frid won a TV talent contest, and made an album for EMI. She made a second in 1971, produced by Benny Andersson, laying the foundations for ABBA. She married Benny on October 6, 1978, divorcing in 1981.

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In August 26, 1992 Anni-Frid married His Highness Prince Heinrich Ruzzo Reuss von Plauen (May 24, 1950–October 29, 1999), of the German Princely Reuss family, who died of cancer at 49 years old. Two years before, her daughter Ann Lise Lotte-Casper (1967–1997) died at only 30 years old in a traffic accident in the USA. Today, Anni-Frid lives in Switzerland, and mostly engages in charity work.

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After the break-up of ABBA in 1982, Frida released a successful Phil Collins-produced album, Something's Going On (with the hit single "I Know There's Something Going On"), though the follow-up Shine was less popular and proved her last foray into the music world for some years. After the Swedish-language album Djupa Andetag (1996), she re-entered the international limelight in 2004 by recording a song, "The Sun will Shine Again", in conjunction with former Deep Purple legend Jon Lord, and also by appearing with Benny and Bj?rn at the London 5th Anniversary performance of the musical based on ABBA songs, Mamma Mia!.

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Plauen: Plauen is a city in Saxony, east-central Germany. The city was founded by Slavs in the 12th century and was passed to Bohemia in 1327 and to Saxony in 1466. The population is 70,070 (Dec 2003). In the late nineteenth century, Plauen became a textile manufacturing center, specializing in lace....

1945: 1945 was a common year starting on Monday (link will take you to calendar)....

ABBA: ABBA (1972?1983) was a Swedish pop music group. They remain the most successful Swedish music act and were one of the most popular groups in the world. Estimates of ABBA's total worldwide sales vary from 140 to 500 million (there seems to be no reliable source for this information) which could make ...