Carl Michael Bellman

Carl Michael Bellman was a Swedish songwriter, composer, musician, poet, and entertainer. He is a central figure in the Swedish song tradition and remains a powerful influence in Swedish music, as well as in Scandinavian literature, to this day. He has been compared to Shakespeare, Beethoven, Mozart, and Hogarth, but his gift, using elegantly rococo classical references in comic contrast to sordid drinking and prostitution—at once regretted and celebrated in song—is unique.

4 February 1740

Born on the same birth day (4 February): Charles Lindbergh • David Newman (screenwriter) • Deng Yingchao • Friedrich Hund • Gavin DeGraw • Giovanni (footballer, born 1972) • Hartley Shawcross • Ivars Timermanis • Luigi Pareyson • Mahmudullah • Natalie Imbruglia • Rebecca White • Stanley Karnow • Tomasz Pacyński • William Talman (actor)

Born in the same month (February 1740): Giambattista Bodoni • Horace Bénédict de Saussure