Sven Zetterberg

Sven Zetterberg first caught the attention of Swedish listeners in the opening years of the 1970s through his command of guitar, harmonica, and gritty, emotionally charged singing. Born in Skärblacka, Sweden, in 1952, he took up the harmonica at twelve after encountering the recordings of Little Walter. His initial group, Telge Blues, came together in 1972 and worked the domestic club circuit for several seasons; afterward he assembled Sven Zetterberg & the Chicago Express. For roughly a decade that ensemble dominated the Swedish blues circuit and produced four long-players—The Blue Solution (1990), Watch Your Step (1991), Permanently Blue (1995), and Steppin’ Out (1996)—before disbanding. During those same years Zetterberg absorbed lessons and shared stages with visiting American masters such as Jimmy Rogers, Sunnyland Slim, and Jimmy McCracklin.

His first visit to the United States occurred in 1979, when he traveled straight to Chicago and established additional musical connections that resulted in the 1983 album Chicago Blues Meeting, which included Sunnyland Slim and S.P. Leary. Zetterberg kept touring and issuing recordings, among them his debut solo effort, Blues from Within, which appeared on the Amigo label in 1999. Let Me Get Over It arrived in spring 2001, and he maintained a steady output over the following fifteen years with Moving in the Right Direction (2004), Southern Soul Agenda (2006), Hollerin’ Up a Storm (2007), Grounded in Reality (2010), Mileage (2012), and Something for Everybody (2016). After completing a Christmas tour in mid-December 2016, he suffered fatal heart failure in Stockholm on the eighteenth of that month at the age of sixty-four.