Freddie Mercury: How a Boy from Zanzibar Named Farrokh Bulsara Became the Voice of Queen
Before the world knew him as Freddie Mercury, he was Farrokh Bulsara. He was born on 5 September 1946 in Zanzibar to Indian parents from the Parsi community.
In 1954, at the age of eight, he was sent to St. Peter’s School, a British-style boarding school for boys in Panchgani, near Bombay. At twelve he formed a school band, the Hectics, and played covers of rock and roll artists.
In 1964 his family fled the Zanzibar Revolution and moved to Middlesex, England. He studied graphic art and design at Ealing Art College, graduating with a diploma in 1969, and later used those skills to design the Queen crest, built from the zodiac signs of the four band members.
In April 1970 he teamed up with Roger Taylor and Brian May to become the lead singer of their band Smile; John Deacon joined in 1971. Freddie chose the name Queen (“It’s very regal obviously, and it sounds splendid,” he said), and at about the same time he legally changed his surname from Bulsara to Mercury.
He wrote many of the band’s biggest songs, among them “Killer Queen”, “Bohemian Rhapsody”, “Somebody to Love”, “We Are the Champions”, “Don’t Stop Me Now” and “Crazy Little Thing Called Love”. Queen’s performance at Live Aid in 1985 was later voted by a group of music executives the greatest live performance in the history of rock.
Mercury was diagnosed with AIDS in 1987 and kept recording with Queen. On 23 November 1991 he announced his diagnosis publicly. About 24 hours later, on 24 November 1991, he died at the age of 45 at his home in Kensington; the cause of death was bronchial pneumonia resulting from AIDS. His voice is on Queen’s final album, Made in Heaven (1995).
Queen has its own station in the Exclusive collection of Kalisha. Open the radio and hear that voice again.
Photo: Carl Lender / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY-SA 3.0
— Kalisha 🎧
Enjoyed this? The app is free to start.
Open in TelegramWorks on iPhone and Android — nothing to install