BÖRJE CRONA'S UNKNOWN CAREER
(An Swedish original text pushed through Google Translate, and then slightly
corrected and edited)
I happened to find the book Stikkan (by Oscar Hedlund, Sweden Music Publishing
AB) about Stig "Stikkan" Anderson, ABBA's manager. The book is from 1983,
roughly when ABBA split up, but Stikkan was at full vigour. Biographies about
people in The entertainment industry is something I have always found
interesting
One of the most interesting things that emerges is that one of Stikkan's best
friends was the author Börje Crona, who unfortunately died last year (Feb 14).
He was musician in younger days but later became perhaps best known for writing
science fiction - or "sandkvist" as his wife Annikki called the genre. Anyway,
Börje and Stikkan were best buddies in the 1950s and toured as a music duo.
Börje mentioned at one point that he knew Stikkan, though I did not reflect on
the matter at the time. But in the Stikkan biography we learn more. Börje Crona
is mentioned quite often in the book, on 13 pages according to the person index
in the end. Listen...
The Touring Life Begins
Stikkan toured in smaller places in the early 1950s to his own guitar
playing. At roughly the same time he met his future wife Gudrun he also met
Börje Crona "a funny guy from Stockholm who became a piece of cream on the now
legendary mashed potatoes "(page 41). Stikkan had written a reasonably
successful song called "Cream on the Mash" ("Grädde på moset").
On page 42, Börje and Stikkan show up on a PR photo - Börje with crossed arms
and he looks a bit mysteriously angry - with the caption: "Event organisers
expected genuine 'artist cards' and the Cream Drops went to the photographer."
As a duo they called themselves the Cream Drops ("Gräddklickarna") or sometimes
Stig Andersson's Cream Drops (page 43) "an attraction on a national level".
More (page 44): "Börje Crona and I had invested in a Stockholm trip in the
spring of 1950 and successfully negotiated with Georg Eliasson. 'Cream on the
Mash' was sold and published ... It was Crona on a leave /from a folk high
school / who succeeded in interesting Roffe /Bengtsson/ for 'Tivedshambo' " so
Roffe recorded Stikkan's song on Börje's suggestion.
"Tivedshambo" was one of the last songs ABBA sang, an a capella performance
with a new text on one of Stikkan's birthdays.
Known from the Radio
Through contacts with the radio man Georg Eliasson (who also wrote the youth sf
book Space Pirates) received an invitation to play in the "Breakfast Club",
Sigge Furst's hugely popular radio program. Page 43:
"And 'Cream on the Mash' then got its big break and you turned up in weekly
magazines and began to think in larger terms than amateur cabarets in Arvika
and Grums ... Börje Crona thought it was a pity that this would cruelly compete
with both Tre Knas and Carl Gustaf Lindstedt, but that's showbiz - tough! "
On page 58 we learn:
"Together with Börje Crona and Bengt Bernhag, they had the experience from
The Cream Drops since 1950 and now, as you say, the 'Stockholm scene' was to be
conquered. It was difficult! It was things like 'The Unknown Half-hour' on the
Nalen club and small shows here and there. But with 'It Will Be No Wedding'
('Det blir inget bröllop') in 1954 ... it began ease up. Swedish Radio gave us
20 minutes one afternoon, Sten Carlberg produced the program which consisted of
two amateurs, borrowed jokes, our own songs as well as Walle Söderlund's
orchestra. There was just one channel at that time, the National Program, so it
felt great. "
The Pay Becomes Pants
It's when Stikkan did his military service that he got a leave to go to
Stockholm. At Stockholm Central (page 48) "Bengt and Börje waited and received
me. Immediately we took the fateful stroll to Vanadisplan and Phillips which
then was there at the classic address 16 Gävle Street." They
also visited Nils-Georg's music publishing (page 63):
"It was Börje and I who stepped in. In an unlikely mess of notebooks,
cigarette plates and old coffee cups, and we finally distinguished two people:
Georg Eliasson and then great piano celebrity Stig Holm."
They bought the songs "Cream on the Mash" and "Tivedshambo" for 100 crowns,
and:
"First, Crona and I went out and the money was just enough to buy to
gabardine pants, but it wasn't enough for a whole suit. Then we went and sat
down in the grass outside the City Hall where I re-wrote ''Cream on the Mash'.
... Then the creamy drops Andersson & Crona had a triumphant homecoming to the
red 'Änglaro' barracks, and the pants had a real shine about them. "
The Dude Jazzed and Smoked
The music duo lived at the same place, a folk high boarding school in Ingesund.
According to page 93:
"The students were lodged in red barracks between the pine trees, and one of
them was called Änglaro which, as a result of Stig Andersson's accession, as
the name seemed like an exaggeration became 'Bänglaro'. /Pun lost to
translation/
'It was the boys for themselves and the girls for themselves ... at least it
was so intended within the rules of the school system. We stayed on the lower
floor /it is Gudrun talking/, the guys on the top. Stikkan's best buddy was
Börje Crona, called The Dude ('Snubben'), and nobody had so handlessly fallen
outside the folk education ideals. The Dude smoked in secret. He brought with
him genuine jazz records from Stockholm and America! "
Gudrun says more about Stikkan's tours: "He / Stikkan / went around and was a
'comedy couple' with different partners, e g Roffe Bengtsson, Minimal Åström.
Börje Crona, Akke Carlsson. "
They also appeared in the Folk Parks. Page 191:
"Hey, now we are in Glava ... that'll make you glad, ah!" /pun 98% lost in
translation/ With this smashing start, Stikkan, Bengt and Börje 'The Dude'
Crona stepped up on the swaying folk park stage planks. There came more
mosquitoes than audience. "
Börje Crona did not continue his artist career, while Stikkan, as we know,
went further in the entertainment industry. The book mentions that Börje
started selling illustrated limericks (which he called mumricks) and took on as
a tourist tour leader, but the book misses that he also worked at the newspaper
Afton-Tidningen in Stockholm (which must have been before and/or until 1956,
because AT was folded).
Father of Görel
As far as I know Börje played the bass, but if I'm not wrong also guitar, when
he was touring with Stikkan (I have a memory image of guitar hanging on the
wall of the Cronas on Döbelns Street). He was a funny guy who liked a good joke
and often carried a little hip flask from which he'd offer a small snaps. As
you may know he is he also the father of actress Görel Crona. I met him in the
audience once when Görel performed with the Park Theatre in Vita Bergen,
Stockholm.
He and his wife Annikki often sent Christmas cards with pictures of
themselves in flower-decorated holiday clothes on the beach from a sunny South
Sea island, where the couple transported themselves during the winter months to
avoid snowy slush in the Vasastan Stockholm district.
The Book That Was Massacred
In addition to being a tour leader and selling stories to the rags he worked as
translator and released a large number of humour books (several with his
"mumricks"). But He was also one of Sweden's most productive sf short story
writers. He had just one novel in print, which he called Kling from the Space
Police ("Kling vid Rymdpolisen"). But that book was so badly massacred by the
typesetter - a guy known in fandom, we may call him B - that when it was
published under a new title World in Danger ("Värld i fara"), Börje had to buy
a newspaper ad and apologise for that the sorry excuse for 'typesetter' had
filled the book with faults, missed jokes and above all 'four-letter' words. He
was ashamed and sorry that he thus couldn't show the book to his old mother, he
later said. (Story on that in Swedish, see note below.)
However, he also published five short-story collections on Delta, between
1977 and 1983 (see https://w.wikipedia.org/wiki/Börje_Crona ;), wrote in Swedish
Galaxy already in 1960, later in both the Jules Verne Magasinet and Nova SF -
and we also published him in Teknikmagasinet, with the fine short story "The
Power Is Mine" ("Makten är min").
The Twist-End Master
As a short story writer, he wanted a good, workable idea and often used a
twist-end, in the tradition of O Henry and Fredric Brown. One Crona story
portrays sport fishing, from the perspective of the fish. Another tells how
amputated limbs are useful in music-making. Another tries to measure the
plants' emotional life. We have a story based on the notion that there is a
hyper space - but you can not travel faster than the light there, you go even
*slower* than in normal space. At the 1979 SF-Kongressen he let the audience
participate in the writing of a story, found in one of his collections as "A
Buried Dog" ("En hund begraven" - one Mr Engholm was one who contributed). He
has written about time travel, invasions from space and nuclear war - all with
the same healthy cheerfulness. Börje Crona wrote snappy and entertaining, but
the almost mandatory final twist-end could sometimes be rather over-strained.
Börje Crona has accomplished the story with sf history's *worst* twist end.
The title has s,lipped from my memory but the story is about a robot stranded a
strange planet. Its electricity begins to fail, but the planet has water. The
robot succeeds in getting electricity and the answer to how it has been done is
the twist-end of the story. I warn sensitive readers! This twist-end can cause
stomach pains, acute constipation and pain in the hair ... when you in
desperation tear in it. Here, with some hesitation, the end of that story:
"You've heard of wattery porridge!"
/So-and-so attempt to rescue a totally useless pun.../
Epilogue
In the obituary in Dagens Nyheter March 9, 2017, the image of the Dude as the
Man of Twisted Ends was confirmed. A nurse who attended to him as he was dying
was named Lisett /"ett" is Swedish for "one"/, and Börje Crona's last words in
his life are reported to have been:
"Is your sister named Listvå?" /"två is Swedish for "two"/
--Ahrvid Engholm
More on Börje Crona
(Try Google Translate on anything that's too Swedish for you!)
https://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Börje_Crona ;
(https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=sv&u=https://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/B%25C3%25B6rje_Crona&prev=search)
The Cream Drops' videos on Youtube, "There Is A Shimmer around Grandfather's
Days": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=646n3ogLUws ;
And "There Will Be No Wedding on Saturday":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBLFSu4xJuU ;
The text of a Stikkan song which Börje Crona apparently recorded alone (but
with orchestra and choir), "It's Great That He's So Nice":
http://textarkivet.atspace.cc/det_ar.htm ;
A really nice short story (in Swedish) about how Christmas is re-invented after
the Great Atomic War:
http://sv.svenskanoveller.wikia.com/wiki/En_riktigt_gammaldags_jul ;
In later years, Börje Crona re-released many of his books (including all his sf
books) as E books, and they are available via e g Adlibris or the libraries.
Not Börje Crona, but ABBA doing "Tivedshambo" (with English subtitles):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0hbNGQPOuU
Börje himself tells (in Swedish) how Kling from the Space Police/World In
Danger was massacred:
www.lysator.liu.se/lsff/mb-nr20/verstteri_och_versitteri.html
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