Marie Fredriksson obituary

Commanding female vocalists were never more popular than in the late 1980s, and for a time Marie Fredriksson, whose voice could blister paint or seduce a kitten, was one of the biggest. The singing half of the Swedish power-pop duo Roxette, she piloted them, with guitarist Per Gessle, to near ubiquity, and 75m record sales. Her widescreen delivery of their four biggest songs – It Must Have Been Love, Joyride, The Look, and Listen to Your Heart – helped to send each to No 1 in the US, a country rarely receptive to Swedish groups, even those singing in English. Britain and the rest of Europe also succumbed, and Fredriksson, who has died of cancer aged 61, was one of pop’s most recognisable frontwomen in Roxette’s 1989‑91 golden hour.

Even those who found the group’s music insubstantial – a view that has recently been undergoing reappraisal – agreed that Fredriksson could sell a song. They included the New York Times, which panned the duo’s first Manhattan concert in 1992 (“Roxette won’t be accused of too much originality … Hearing Roxette could make a listener long for Abba”), while praising Fredriksson: “[Their] main asset is Marie Fredriksson, a singer with a sob in her voice [and] a platinum-blond Billy Idol hairdo.” In fact, the hairdo was closer to Annie Lennox’s streamlined crop, and Fredriksson was as angular and statuesque as the Eurythmics singer. She and Gessle probably did not engineer their look to resemble Lennox and her musical partner Dave Stewart, but there was an undeniable similarity, adding to the perception that Roxette were lightweights. “We don’t care what they say,” Gessle maintained in 1990. “We’re used to people saying our music sounds like crap.”

Vocally, though, Fredriksson was her own woman, rippling through her three-octave range in a display of both emotion and mezzo-soprano technique. English was her default language for Roxette songs – a necessary commercial decision, but also one that shielded her from the “vulnerability” she said she felt when singing in Swedish. Nonetheless, seven of the eight solo albums she made between 1984 and 2013 were in her native language – all were substantial hits in her home country – and showed a gentler side.

She performed the arrestingly lovely solo ballad Ännu Doftar Kärlek (Still the Scent of Love) at the wedding of Sweden’s Princess Madeleine in 2013, and maintained friendly relations with the royal family for the rest of her life. “For many in our country, as well as in my own family, her music is closely associated with memories of particularly important moments in life,” said King Carl XVI Gustav in response to the announcement of her death. As the bestselling Swedish group of all time after Abba, Roxette always retained a place in Swedish hearts: it is clear from social media reaction to her death that Fredriksson was a formative pop influence on many a Swede’s adolescence.

Born Gun-Marie in Össjö, a village in the far south of Sweden, she was the youngest of the five children of Charles Fredriksson and his wife, Inez (nee Hoffert). Charles was a postman, Inez a factory worker, and Marie and siblings were often left to their own devices while their parents were at work. She took advantage of their absence to learn to sing and play instruments, and pursued her interest by enrolling at a music college.

Yearning to perform for an audience, she was bored by the course’s academic leanings, but stayed on to graduate. She moved to the port city of Halmstad at 19, and joined her boyfriend’s punk band, Strul, where she met Gessle. Impressed by her voice, he got her an audition with the producer Lasse Lindbom, who offered her a contract. Her soft-rockish debut LP, Het Vind (Hot Wind, 1984), was the first of eight solo successes, three of which topped the Swedish album chart.

Though her career was going well, she agreed to record a duet with Gessle, Neverending Love, which was released in 1986 under the Roxette name. It took another nine singles before they broke internationally, with The Look. When the hit machine ran out of petrol, Fredriksson resumed her solo career, while still working with Gessle on the occasional Roxette release. In 1994 she married the singer-songwriter Mikael Bolyos, with whom she had two children, Josefin and Oscar.

A seizure in 2002 caused her to fracture her skull. Scans revealed a malignant brain tumour. It was treated successfully; although she lost the sight in her right eye, she was able to return to work in 2004.

Three more solo albums and three Roxette albums followed, along with nearly 300 concert dates, but in 2016, her health again deteriorating, she announced her retirement with the words: “I feel nothing but joy and happiness when I look back.”.

She is survived by Mikael and her children.

• Gun-Marie Fredriksson, singer, born 30 May 1958; died 9 December 2019