Freddie Mercury led a solo career and was a producer and guest musician for other artists.
80 Facts About Freddie Mercury
2.
Freddie Mercury continued to record with Queen, and posthumously featured on their final album, Made in Heaven.
3.
In 1990, he and the other Queen members were awarded the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to British Music, and one year after his death, Freddie Mercury was awarded it individually.
4.
In 2002, Freddie Mercury was voted number 58 in the BBC's poll of the 100 Greatest Britons.
5.
Freddie Mercury was born Farrokh Bulsara in Stone Town in the British protectorate of Zanzibar on 5 September 1946.
6.
Freddie Mercury was born with four extra incisors, to which he attributed his enhanced vocal range.
7.
Freddie Mercury spent most of his childhood in India where he began taking piano lessons at the age of seven while living with relatives.
8.
In 1954, at the age of eight, Freddie Mercury was sent to study at St Peter's School, a British-style boarding school for boys, in Panchgani near Bombay.
9.
Freddie Mercury later used these skills to design heraldic arms for his band Queen.
10.
Freddie Mercury briefly lived in a flat above the Dovedale Towers, a pub on Penny Lane in Liverpool's Mossley Hill district.
11.
Shortly before the release of Queen's self-titled first album, Freddie Mercury designed the band's logo, known as the "Queen crest".
12.
Freddie Mercury's phrasing was subtle, delicate and sweet or energetic and slamming.
13.
Freddie Mercury was able to find the right colouring or expressive nuance for each word.
14.
Really think Freddie Mercury, I mean that's the kind of range we're talking about.
15.
In 2003 Freddie Mercury was posthumously inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame with the rest of Queen, and in 2005 all four band members were awarded an Ivor Novello Award for Outstanding Song Collection from the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers, and Authors.
16.
Freddie Mercury wrote six songs from Queen II which deal with multiple key changes and complex material.
17.
Freddie Mercury composed most of his songs on the piano and used a wide variety of key signatures.
18.
Freddie Mercury was noted for his live performances, which were often delivered to stadium audiences around the world.
19.
Freddie Mercury displayed a highly theatrical style that often evoked a great deal of participation from the crowd.
20.
Freddie Mercury's main prop on stage was a broken microphone stand; after accidentally snapping it off the heavy base during an early performance, he realised it could be used in endless ways.
21.
Freddie Mercury's powerful, sustained note during the a cappella section came to be known as "The Note Heard Round the World".
22.
Freddie Mercury, as evidenced by his Dionysian Live Aid performance, was easily the most godlike of them all.
23.
Freddie Mercury was often self-deprecating about his skills on both instruments.
24.
From 1982 Freddie Mercury collaborated with Morgan Fisher, and from 1985 onward Freddie Mercury collaborated with Mike Moran and Spike Edney.
25.
Freddie Mercury used concert grand pianos and, occasionally, other keyboard instruments such as the harpsichord.
26.
Songs like "Ogre Battle" and "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" were composed on the guitar; the latter featured Freddie Mercury playing rhythm guitar on stage and in the studio.
27.
Eleven years later, Freddie Mercury contributed to the soundtrack for the restoration of the 1927 Fritz Lang film Metropolis.
28.
The song "Love Kills" was written for the film by Giorgio Moroder in collaboration with Freddie Mercury, and produced by Moroder and Mack; in 1984 it debuted at the number 10 position in the UK Singles Chart.
29.
AllMusic critic Eduardo Rivadavia describes Mr Bad Guy as "outstanding from start to finish" and expressed his view that Freddie Mercury "did a commendable job of stretching into uncharted territory".
30.
Caballe sang it live at the opening of the Olympics with Freddie Mercury's part played on a screen, and again before the start of the 1999 UEFA Champions League Final between Manchester United and Bayern Munich in Barcelona.
31.
In 1986 Freddie Mercury recorded two songs for Dave Clark's West End sci-fi musical Time.
32.
Freddie Mercury narrated the album [Time], and, when Freddie came on, singing "Time", Olivier said, 'Now, my dear boy, there's an actor.
33.
Freddie Mercury included the solo version of "There Must Be More to Life Than This" on his Mr Bad Guy album.
34.
Freddie Mercury lived with Austin for several years in West Kensington, London.
35.
Freddie Mercury moved out of the flat they shared, and bought Austin a place of her own near his new address of 12 Stafford Terrace, Kensington.
36.
Freddie Mercury lived at Kirchberger's apartment and thanked him "for board and lodging" in the liner notes of his 1985 album Mr Bad Guy.
37.
Freddie Mercury wore a silver wedding band given to him by Kirchberger.
38.
Freddie Mercury described their relationship as one built on solace and understanding, and said that he "honestly couldn't ask for better".
39.
Freddie Mercury wore a gold wedding band, given to him by Hutton in 1986, until the end of his life.
40.
Hutton later relocated from London to the bungalow he and Freddie Mercury had built for themselves in Ireland.
41.
In 1975, Freddie Mercury visited Everett, bringing with him an advance copy of the single "Bohemian Rhapsody".
42.
Freddie Mercury saw the stage version of the London musical The Rocky Horror Show at the Royal Court Theatre in Chelsea, and in 1975 went to see the film version, both of which starred Tim Curry.
43.
Shortly before his own death in November 1991, Freddie Mercury ordered a watercolour by John's favourite artist, the 19th-century English impressionist painter Henry Scott Tuke, to be given to John on Christmas Day.
44.
Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain's suicide note mentions how he admired and envied the way Freddie Mercury "seemed to love, relish in the love and adoration from the crowd".
45.
Freddie Mercury never discussed his ethnic or religious background with journalists.
46.
Freddie Mercury did occasionally express his concerns about the state of the world in his lyrics.
47.
Freddie Mercury cared for at least ten cats throughout his life, including: Tom, Jerry, Oscar, Tiffany, Dorothy, Delilah, Goliath, Miko, Romeo, and Lily.
48.
Freddie Mercury was against the inbreeding of cats for specific features and all except for Tiffany and Lily, both given as gifts, were adopted from the Blue Cross.
49.
Freddie Mercury "placed as much importance on these beloved animals as on any human life", and showed his adoration by having the artist Ann Ortman paint portraits of each of them.
50.
Freddie Mercury wrote a song for Delilah, "his favourite cat of all", which appeared on the Queen album Innuendo.
51.
Freddie Mercury dedicated his liner notes in his 1985 solo album Mr Bad Guy to Jerry and his other cats.
52.
In 1987, Freddie Mercury celebrated his 41st birthday at the Pikes Hotel, Ibiza, Spain, several months after discovering that he had contracted HIV.
53.
Freddie Mercury played some tennis, lounged by the pool, and ventured out to the odd gay club or bar at night.
54.
Around that time, Freddie Mercury claimed in an interview to have tested negative for HIV.
55.
At the 1990 Brit Awards held at the Dominion Theatre, London, on 18 February, Freddie Mercury made his final appearance on stage, when he joined the rest of Queen to collect the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to British Music.
56.
Freddie Mercury always said, 'I don't want to put any burden on other people by telling them my tragedy.
57.
Freddie Mercury [Freddie] was one of the funniest people I ever encountered.
58.
Freddie Mercury was saying [of his illness] 'I'm not going to think about it, I'm going to do this.
59.
Freddie Mercury's former partner, Mary Austin, was a particular comfort in his final years, and in the last few weeks made regular visits to look after him.
60.
Freddie Mercury chose to hasten his death by refusing medication and took only painkillers.
61.
On 22 November 1991, Freddie Mercury called Queen's manager Jim Beach to his Kensington home to prepare a public statement, which was released the following day:.
62.
Freddie Mercury defied the conventions of a rock frontman, with his highly theatrical style influencing the artistic direction of Queen.
63.
Freddie Mercury was individually posthumously awarded the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to British Music in 1992.
64.
In November 1995, Freddie Mercury appeared posthumously on Queen's final studio album Made in Heaven.
65.
In 2009 a star commemorating Freddie Mercury was unveiled in Feltham, west London where his family moved upon arriving in England in 1964.
66.
In December 2009 a large model of Freddie Mercury wearing tartan was displayed in Edinburgh as publicity for the run of We Will Rock You.
67.
The band's performance of "We Will Rock You" with Jessie J was opened with a video of Freddie Mercury's "call and response" routine from 1986's Wembley Stadium performance, with the 2012 crowd at the Olympic Stadium responding appropriately.
68.
The site of the discovery is very near to where Freddie Mercury spent most of his childhood.
69.
On 1 September 2016, an English Heritage blue plaque was unveiled at Freddie Mercury's home in 22 Gladstone Avenue in Feltham, west London by his sister, Kashmira Cooke, and Brian May Attending the ceremony, Karen Bradley, the UK Secretary of State for Culture, called Freddie Mercury "one of Britain's most influential musicians", and added he "is a global icon whose music touched the lives of millions of people around the world".
70.
Freddie Mercury Alley is a 107-yard-long alley next to the British embassy in the Ujazdow district in Warsaw, Poland, which is dedicated to Mercury, and was unveiled on 22 November 2019.
71.
Freddie Mercury has featured in international advertising to represent the UK.
72.
For instance, in a 2002 vote to determine who the UK public considers the greatest British people in history, Freddie Mercury was ranked 58 in the list of the 100 Greatest Britons, broadcast by the BBC.
73.
Freddie Mercury was further listed at the 52nd spot in a 2007 Japanese national survey of the 100 most influential heroes.
74.
Freddie Mercury was voted the greatest male singer in MTV's 22 Greatest Voices in Music.
75.
On 24 November 1997, a monodrama about Freddie Mercury's life, titled Mercury: The Afterlife and Times of a Rock God, opened in New York City.
76.
The play was written and directed by Charles Messina and the part of Freddie Mercury was played by Khalid Goncalves and then later, Amir Darvish.
77.
Billy Squier opened one of the shows with an acoustic performance of a song he had written about Freddie Mercury titled "I Have Watched You Fly".
78.
Freddie Mercury was portrayed by Rami Malek, who received the Academy Award, BAFTA Award, Golden Globe Award and Screen Actors Guild Award for Best Actor, for his performance.
79.
Freddie Mercury appeared as a supporting character in the BBC television drama Best Possible Taste: The Kenny Everett Story, first broadcast in October 2012.
80.
Freddie Mercury was played by actor John Blunt in The Freddie Mercury Story: Who Wants to Live Forever, first broadcast in the UK on Channel 5 in November 2016.