Swedish opera diva and founder/manager of a palace theater. Dellert debuted as a vocalist when she won a radio competition with "Someone to Watch over Me" on Arthur Godfrey's program in New York in 1948. As an operatic singer, she made her debut at Stora Theater of Gothenburg in the operetta "La belle Hélène" in 1951. She wanted to go to the Stockholm Opera despite a lower salary there. Her debut there was in 1952 as Musetta in "La Bohème". After operetta-type roles, in 1954 she took on opera with "Carmen", Verdi's Leonora in "The Troubadour" and Amelia in "A Masked Ball". From 1961 onwards, she sang mostly character roles, including Florence Pike in "Albert Herring" in 1972. Her other roles included "Tosca," Marie in "Wozzeck," and the double role Daisy Doody / La Garçonne in Blomdahl-Martinson-Lindegren's 1959 opera "Aniara". She retired from the Stockholm Opera in 1979. Kjerstin Dellert was also known as the initiator and producer of gala performances for special celebrations, such as the Riksdag-funded and star-studded show that was given at the Opera House in 1976 for King Carl Gustaf's and Queen Silvia's wedding (where ABBA performed "Dancing Queen " for the first time in Sweden, and La Dellert sang "O, Carl Gustaf" to the king), as well as her own star-studded 50th birthday show at Södra Theater in 1975. There she summed up her life so far in a Swedish version of "My Way" with lyrics by Lars Jacob, updated and reprised in 2015 for her 90th birthday, when she also recorded it for YouTube ("Min sång 2015" produced by Emil Eikner.) She recorded a wide variety of songs from opera and operetta to pop, blues, jazz and ballads, appeared on television in Sweden and at many events all over Europe. She held a colonel's rank in the Swedish Army for entertaining troops on duty in foreign locations and was given numerous gold medals and other awards for her other cultural activities. Aided by the kings's sister Princess Christina Magnuson, she spent decades refurbishing an 18th-century royal palace theater at historic Ulriksdal in Solna, Sweden, founded as Confidencen in 1981, and she was its managing director almost till the end of her life. She and her husband lived in the equally antique Ottilielund building next to the theater. She was born in Katarina Parish of Stockholm, the daughter of wholesaler Oscar Dellert (1896–1990) and Elisabet "Lizzie" Dellert née Blomqvist (1897–1995, remarried as Askell). She was married 1947-1966 to business manager Carl-Olof Bergh (1923–2007), with whom she had her only child, son Thomas "Thotte" Dellert. Her marriage in 1968 to ballet master Nils Åke Häggbom was reported as sensational because he was 14 years younger than she. She was known personally for her generosity, quick wit, humanity, loyal friendship with those who deserved it, civil courage and independent lifestyle. When she died, a considerable amount of friends and colleagues called her "an utterly fantastic person." Her ashes have been kept in private pending disposition.