Jakob Lindberg

Jakob Lindberg stands among the leading figures in lute performance, distinguished by an extensive discography that has repeatedly illuminated lesser-known repertoire. Beyond the lute itself, he has taken up additional instruments from the guitar family both in ensemble settings and as an accompanist, while also leading Baroque opera productions from the stage. His work as a teacher has formed a substantial part of his professional life.

Born on October 16, 1952, in Djursholm, a suburb of Stockholm, Lindberg developed an early passion for the music of The Beatles that prompted him to begin guitar instruction. The same teacher sparked his interest in the lute, after which he pursued undergraduate studies at Stockholm University. Although he continued to play both instruments, advanced training at the Royal College of Music in London under Diana Poulton steered his focus toward Renaissance and Baroque repertory on historically appropriate instruments. His London debut at Wigmore Hall in 1978 launched a worldwide solo career that has encompassed appearances across Europe and the United States as well as engagements in Japan and Mexico. The following year he succeeded Poulton on the faculty of the Royal College of Music.

In 1983 Lindberg performed as a lutenist in the Doctor Who episode “The King’s Demons.” His recording debut arrived in 1984 with the BIS release Faire, Sweet & Cruell: Elizabethan Songs, made in collaboration with soprano Christina Hogman. Nearly all of his subsequent projects have appeared on the same label. In recital he occasionally performs on a rare lute built by the Augsburg maker Sixtus Rauwolf, one of the oldest instruments still in active use. Chamber-music activities include his founding of the Dowland Consort in 1985, while continuo duties have placed him with leading period-instrument ensembles such as The English Concert, the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, and the Academy of Ancient Music, most often on archlute or theorbo.

Singers including Nigel Rogers, Ian Partridge, and Anne Sofie von Otter have regularly sought his services as an accompanist, and he has directed opera productions from the chitarrone at the Royal Swedish Opera in Stockholm. His recorded output, exceeding one hundred releases by the early 2020s, encompasses the first complete survey of Dowland’s solo lute music issued in 1995 and previously undocumented court music from Sweden’s golden age. He has also devoted attention to Bach’s infrequently heard lute works, issuing Bach on the Rauwolf Lute in 2021 and returning to BIS in 2024 with Robert de Visée: Theorbo Solo.