Samuel, born 26 December 1976 in Umeå, is a Swedish songwriter and gospel/soul singer. Samuel has his roots in the Salvation Army and was also a football player at a young age. When he was 20, he came to a crossroad where he had to chose sport or music. Music it was, and with it a move to Stockholm. In Stockholm, he was involved in the Salvation Army church work and had a chance to develop his singing talent by including various gospel choirs, where Vasa Gospel probably had the greatest impact. In the late 90′s, he bet on a solo career and was awarded the 2000 Utbult scholarship and released an EP from a collaboration with Stefan Olsson.

In addition to gospel music, 60 – and 70′s soul, funk and R’n'B increasingly penetrated Samuels´ music through the years. Some of the models are Stevie Wonder, Donny Hathaway, Ray Charles and Kirk Franklin.

In February 2005 Ljungblahd released his first album, “Samuel Ljungblahd”, containing partly newly written and some material from the EP, all written by Samuel himself and Stefan Olsson.

Both before and after he released his debut album Samuel has toured around Sweden and Scandinavia. Mostly on the Christian scene, but also on many secular venues and festivals. However, it is in the Christian market he has his biggest audience. 2005 Samauel was the first Swedish main act ever to board the main stage on the Christian summer festival Frizon. He has also been seen in many other contexts, since 2006 he has been one of two leadsingers at the Swedish edition of TV success “Dancing with the stars”

In autumn 2007 Samuel released his second album, ”Reason why”. The CD was highly recognized in Sweden and even in Norway, where he also did a lot of concerts.

In spring 2009, he made an apperance in the Swedish TV-show “Så ska det låta”. He was stand-in for an artist who had been forced to cancel and succeeded so well that at the end of the season he won SVT viewers vote on who people prefered to see in the next season.

Perhaps his biggest breakthrough to date, was the release concert for his third album, “No.3”. His idol and inspiration Kirk Franklin visited Sweden and Samuel was offered to be the opening act for the concert. During the press conference before the concert Samuel met Kirk Franklin for the first time and Kirk challenged Samuel to sing something. So he did and impressed Kirk Franklin a lot. Franklin offered Samuel to sing during his part of the concert. Samuel sang ”Do not Cry” in a duet with Nikki Ross. The number was the concert’s top moment and Kirk Franklin laid down on the floor, symbolic floored.

His latest album, No.3, has been praised in particular Christian press. And it has received substantially routation on Swedish national radio. The album release was followed up by a nation wide tour.

During 2010 Samuel has been on several TV-shows and was also invited by Swedens first lady of soul , Lisa Nilsson, as a guest solist on the last show of her tour.

Samuel was also one of the artists preforming on the big “Nordisk Julekonsert” recorded by DR (Danish televison) and aired all over Scandinavia during Christmas 2010.

Samuel is a true entertainer and he captures the audience with his high energetic preformances. An important part of his preformance is to convey his strong believe in the Gospel according to the bible.

Currently Samuel is living in Umeå together with his wife Anna and their two daughters.