ABBA

A. The name ABBA


At first, the offical name of ABBA was ‘Björn, Benny, Agnetha & Frida’. However, in early 1973, Stig Anderson tired of this unwieldy name, started to refer to the group privately and publicly as ABBA. This was a play on words, as Abba is also the name of a well-known fish-canning company in Sweden. However, since the fish canners were unknown outside Sweden, Anderson came to believe the name would work in international markets. As a coincidence, "abba" exists as a word in the Aramaic and Hebrew languages. It means "father", but in the more informal familiar sense that saying "dad" might connote. Later the group negotiated with the canners for the right to the name. "ABBA" is an acronym formed from the first letters of each group member's name. The first 'B' in the logo version of the name was "mirror-image" reversed on the band's promotional material from 1976 onwards and became the group's registered trademark.



B. The forming of ABBA

Benny Andersson

Benny Andersson became member of a popular Swedish pop-rock group, The Hep Stars at his age of 18. The Hep Stars were known as "The Swedish Beatles.” Andersson played keyboard and eventually started writing original compositions for his band, many of which became major hits, such as "Sunny Girl", "Wedding", "Consolation." All of the songs became the great hits at that time. During the ABBA years, Andersson together with Ulvaeus wrote music to and produced eight studio albums with the ABBA. The group achieved great success globally and scored a chain of #1 hits.



Björn Ulvaeus

Björn Ulvaeus began to play and sing in a skiffle group when he was 11. A few years later, he became a member of the Swedish folk band, Hootenanny Singers. In June 1966, Benny Andersson and Björn Ulvaeus started writing songs together. Their songwriting collaboration has led quite naturally to the very close co-operation which the four friends had during the following years. After ABBA broke up, they still kept a good realtionship and co-composed the musical version of “Mama Mia!”

In 2008, Ulvaeus revealed that he suffered from severe long-term memory loss and now no longer remember many important events in his life. He has little memory of some of the critical events in his professional history. Now he resorted to images of his past and even try hypnotising himself to bring back his memory.



Agnetha Fältskog

艾格妮塔佛絲歌



Agnetha Fältskog won a #1 record in Sweden when she was only 17. She was noted as a talented singer and songwriter of schlager style songs. Schlager style is sweet, highly sentimental ballads with a simple, catchy melody. In 1968, she met Björn Ulvaeus at a concert. Later she met Ulvaeus again, and they were married in 1971.



Anni-Frid Lyngstad (Frida)

安妮佛瑞琳絲塔



Frida sang from the age of thirteen with various dance bands. She first worked mainly in a jazz-oriented cabaret and she attend a competition. In 1967, she won the national talent competition with the song "En ledig dag.“ After she won the contest, she sang this song on TV. In 1969, she met Andersson for the first time, and they soon became a couple.



C. Why they compose for musicals?

Björn and Benny was Influenced by the composer in the 70s, Andrew Lloyd Webber. Their first try is The Girl with The Golden Hair in 1977 ‘s ABBA concert. In 1982, ABBA broke up due to the disagreement on the spirit of music and ABBA. Björn and Benny met a British musical composer, Tim Rice . They decide to work together as the name B & B and started to make songs in musical field, instead of pop music. Later They wrote for the musical Chess but failed. This musical ran for three years in the West End of London. While on Broadway, it opened for only 2 months and closed because of bad reviews. Their masterpiece is Kristina från Duvemåla (Kristina From Duvenata), an epic Swedish musical. This musical ran for more than 5 years. Finally they produced Mamma Mia. They used many hit songs in the past, including Mamma Mia.

Background

Mamma Mia! was a musical which was composed by a British playwright Catherine Johnson. The musical based on the ABBA’s songs, which were composed by Benny Andersson and Björn Ulvaeus, both were the members of ABBA. They not only composed the original music for ABBA bust also got involved in the development of the show from the beginning. Although the name of this musical was taken from ABBA’s 1975 chart-topper Mamma Mia, the plot is fictional, not biographical.

The musical included many hits such as "Super Trouper", "Dancing Queen", "Knowing Me, Knowing You", "SOS" and so on. You will see the song list on another transparency later. Most of the songs were still intact. However, there were still some exceptions such as “Under Attack", "One of Us", and “Knowing Me, Knowing You". Also, ”When All Is Said and Done" was a song which did not used in the musical, but it was added for the film sung by Sam, Donna, and the company.

The musical had been seen by over ten million people worldwide. The first performance was shown in Prince Edward Theatre, London, on 6th April, 1999. Afterwards, there have been different versions of performances in theaters around the world; moreover, there were over 18 thousand people who viewed Mamma Mia! every night.

Box office (musical)

Mama Mia! was first showed on Broadway on May 15,2005. Once, it was showed, it got many positive feedbacks. Also, Mama Mia! surpassed many other musicals that time such as The Sound of Music, The King and I, and Damn Yankees with 1,500 performances. Until August 19, 2009, Mama Mia! was the 13th longest running Broadway musicals of all time with 2,343 performances Besides, until January 2008 Mamma Mia! became the longest daily running show in the history of Russian theatre. As of 2008, Mama Mia! has been performed in eleven languages: English, German, Norwegian, Japanese, , Korean, Spanish, a mix between Catalan and Spanish, Swedish and Russian.





Plot

The story was set on a Greek island. Sophie wanted to know who her father was, but her mother, Donna was  not willing to talk about the past. Sophie found her mother's diary, and found that Donna had intimate relationships with three men who were Harley, Bill, and Sam. Sophie thought that there must be a man who was his father among these three. Therefore, she sent each one of them her wedding ceremony invitations  without letting her mother know. The three men had different characteristics; they are Harley,  Bill and  Sam. Tanya and Rosie, two of Donna's special friends were invited to the wedding ceremony, too.   These two women and Donna formed the chorus group called Donna and the Dynamos before. Sophie tried very hard to find his real father. However, she couldn't make sure who the real one was. Therefore, there were many interesting things happening in the movie. Finally, Sophie and his fiancé found that they didn't really want to get marry. They gave this chance to Donna and one of the three men. Do you want to know who Donna got married to at last? Who was the real father of Sophie? Go to watch it, and you will know.

Box office (movie)

Mama Mia! made $9,627,000 in its opening day in the United States and Canada and $27,605,376 in its opening weekend. Its box office was the top two at that time; it was only behind The Dark Knight. Mama Mia! was the highest grossing opening weekend for a movie musical. It broke the record that Hairspray set in 2007. As of April 6, 2009, Mamma Mia! had grossed $602,609,487 in total worldwide, and it was the fifth highest grossing film in 2008. Also, it was the 42nd highest grossing film of all time. As of October 26, 2008, it became the highest-grossing movie musical of all time worldwide. It is the third highest-grossing film, which made $458,479,424 in total, of 2008 internationally (North America was not included), and the thirteenth highest gross of 2008 in North America (included US and Canada) with $144,130,063.

The song Mamma Mia

Today, when we hear the title Mamma Mia, we think of the musical and the hit movie that was shown in 2008. But the song that gave the show its name was also the single that established ABBA as an international hit act.

In the summer of 1975, just a few months after ABBA released their third album (simply entitled ABBA), the group were a bit uncertain as to the future of their international career. Things were looking very good in most of Europe, where both their singles and their albums were sold well, but they did not gain so much popularity in Great Britain. Certainly, the group had enjoyed a number one hit with ‘Waterloo’ a year earlier, but since then their singles had just kept flopping, and their albums were routinely dismissed. Because ABBA had achieved their breakthrough through the Eurovision Song Contest, they were automatically regarded as one-hit wonders. They simply weren’t supposed to have any more hits in Great Britain. But things were soon to turn around for the band, thanks to events on the other side of the planet – and thanks to one of the strongest tracks on their latest album – that is Mamma Mia.

“The saying ‘mamma mia’ is used very, very commonly in Swedish and is just as well known a phrase as it would be in English.” This song is a good example of how ABBA would explore the possibilities of the recording studio, with the actual tune of the song being only one of the many things happening on the recording. Mamma Mia’ is one of those typical ABBA songs which really don’t work that well when you play them with just a piano and a guitar. It’s not really a record is it? It’s like four or five guys just trying to play something together.

After the single, Mamma Mia was released, it occupied the number one position for a staggering 10 weeks top. The success in Australia was incredible in itself, but it also had the effect of making ABBA’s British record company sit up and take notice.

Money, money, money

This song, “money, money, money” was released in 1976. It followed the success of their previous single “dancing queen” in UK and also other country like Australia, not in America. Although it is not popular in America, it is still considered to be the classic of ABBA.

“Money, money, money” is a song that contains a sense of musical and is said to be the indication of ABBA’s musical, “Mamma mia”. This song was originally “Gypsy girl” and is used to describe the magic power of money that attracts girls and girls’ longing for money, wealth. We usually hear this from other that money is not everything, but the truth is that “Money isn’t everything but without it you are almost next to nothing.” I think this song reflects the reality of the world we live in and it is also trying to make fun of money! Besides, this song is applied to many TV shows like “The Celebrity Apprentice” and a Japanese program “Golden Legend.”



I Have a Dream

“I Have a Dream” is the last single of ABBA. It is the 7th of the 10 tracks from the album Voulez-Vous and was never originally intended to be a single. It was released as a souvenir for UK fans who had attended the concerts to promote their tour in 1979. ABBA did not film a promotional video for the track, even though they had done for the Spanish version, "Estoy Soñando". So, they recorded their live performance during the tour in Wembley gym as their music video. In this music video, ABBA sang with a children chorus and this song has put a perfect end to International children' Year which is 1979. It is the 26th best selling single of 1999 in UK and also the last best selling one of ABBA. This song is filled with optimism and makes people encouraged when listening to it especially for those who are in their hardest times.

In 2001, the song “I have a dream” was re-recorded with additional vocals by Indonesian child singer for charity as part of a UNICEF fund-rai



Lay all your love on me by ABBA



This song is", originally called "Yarrafat". It’s recorded by Swedish pop group ABBA in 1980 in their Super Trouper album. The writer and the producer of this popular song is Benny Andersson, Bojom Ulvaeus. "Lay All Your Love on me" appears on the group's ABBA Gold: Greatest Hits collection. The singing lead for this electro-disco song was by Benny Andersson and Bjorn Ulvaeus, with Agnetha Faltskog. This song released in 1981 as a 12-inch single only in selected territories, managed to top the Billboard Hot Dance Club Play chart and peaked at 7 on the UK singles chart becoming at the time the highest ever charting 12-inch release in UK chart history.

The album Super Trouper sold 100.000 copies in one day in Great Britain. This song has one of the largest words sung on a pop hit; it was Incomprehensible with 16 letters. ABBA did not film a promotional video for "Lay All Your Love on Me", and so Epic hastily assembled a video by using excerpts from existing Abba videos, which was then shown on British television. It was made available on the ABBA Gold: Greatest Hits VHS video in 1992, followed by the DVD version over 10 years late



Chiquitita



I think this beautiful song is about a girl named chiquitita and she used to dance and sing but her boyfriend break her heart so she is telling it to her mother and her mother is supporting her that she will be ok. It is a very beautiful song because it is not only for the music, but for the fact that it was written by a mother to her daughter on her first love.

Originally, this was called "In The Arms Of Rozellita." Bjorn Ulvaeus, who wrote the song, liked the title but couldn't find a matching story, so it became "Chiquitita.

"Chiquitita" means "little girl" in Spanish was the first single release from Swedish mega pop group ABBA's Voulez-Vous album. After their success with their English version, Abba also recorded “Chiqitita” in Spanish despite the fact the band had never learned the language. Their Spanish version is enhanced their popularity in a number of Latin America countries such as Mexico. Spain, Paraguay. ABBA performed this song in 1999 at the Music for UNICEF Concert. ABBA donated half the proceeds from the song to UNICEF.

In Mamma Mia this is sung to the mother Donna by two of her former band mates when she gets really upset and hides under the covers.