Freddie Mercury

Freddie Mercury; He Will Rock You

Biographical Sketch

On September 5th, 1946 in Zanzibar, Tanzania, Farookh Bulsara or as we know him, Freddie Mercury was born. During his youth, Freddie studied piano at St. Peter’s School in Bombay, India. At the age of 12, he formed a school band that covered rock and roll artist such as Little Richard and Cliff Richard call The Hectics ("Freddie Mercury"). One childhood friend of Freddie’s said that, "He had an uncanny ability to listen to the radio and replay what he heard on piano." (O'Donnell).

When Freddie was 17, due to the Zanzibar Revolution and for safety reasons, he and his family fled to Feltham, Middlesex, England. There he attended Ealing College of Art where he got a degree in art and graphic design; he later used these skills to design the crest for Queen ("Freddie Mercury"). After graduation, Mercury had 2 failed attempts at music with the bands Ibex, later know as Wreckage, and Sour Milk Sea. Then in April 1970, Freddie joined forces with guitarist Brian May and drummer Roger Taylor who were previously with the band Smile. After seeing a wanted poster for a bassist in 1971, John Deacon joined the group and together they formed the band Queen, which Freddie named and was the lead singer of.

After releasing 2 albums, the first in 1973, it wasn’t until 1974 that Queen began to gain popularity with the album Sheer Heart Attack (“Freddie Mercury”). Along with the album came their first big hit written by Freddie himself called “Killer Queen”, which is about a high-class girl. Being described as a combination of hard rock and glam rock, Queen came out with an even bigger hit album the next year called A Night at the Opera. Rolling Stone compiled a list of the 500 greatest albums of all time and this album came in at number 231 ("Rolling Stone”). This album featured arguable Queen’s greatest song ever, which is a 7-minute operetta called “Bohemian Rhapsody”, written again by Freddie. In this song,...