Ulf Björlin

Who was Ulf Björlin?

Mats Ulf Stefan Björlin was a Swedish composer and conductor.

Björlin was born in Stockholm and went as a 19-year old to study music for the conductor Igor Markevitch in Salzburg, later continuing at the Conservatoire de Paris, where he had Nadia Boulanger as a teacher. After completing his military service, he worked at the Royal Swedish Opera in Stockholm and at the Malmö College of Music. From 1962, he was employed as musical producer at Sveriges Radio and wrote music for several movies and television productions, including the series of films and TV series about the children on the island Saltkråkan, based on Astrid Lindgren's scripts.

Together with Sven-Bertil Taube, he produced a number of recordings of songs by Carl Michael Bellman, Evert Taube and Ulf Peder Olrog. He conducted several recordings of orchestral music by fellow Swedes Johan Helmich Roman and Franz Berwald.

During the last years before his death, he worked in Florida where he was conductor of the Florida Philharmonic Orchestra and the Palm Beach Symphony. He died in Palm Beach, Florida.

Björlin received the Fritz Gustaf Grafström Prize in 1961 and shared the Evert Taube Prize with Sven-Bertil Taube in 1975.