Even tabloid rag The Sun mourned him (Image via Wikipedia)
You couldn’t do this with any other song. Go into a chatroom where people from all round the world are connected at any one time. A guild chat in an online game will do. Type these words:
I see a little silhouetto of a man…
Not only will you immediately receive the appropriate response – Scaramouche, Scaramouche will you do the fandango? – but your contacts will happily provide you with the lyrics for the entire song. Quite possibly in time to the music as well.
Extravagant, hugely talented, handsome, ridiculous Freddie Mercury, lead singer of Queen, left an enormous mark on rock music when he died of AIDS-related causes in November 1991. He was one of the first celebrities to openly succumb to the virus, even if his illness was not officially named until the weekend he died because of the social opprobrium attached to “the gay disease”. And indeed, the inevitable vicious comments from the ignorant and hateful filled the media. However, there was also a lot of public support from others, such as Elton John. The three surviving members of Queen released a short documentary celebrating his life and ending with the statement “Freddie was our friend and we loved him”. They also set up a charity, dubbed The Mercury Phoenix Trust, to promote AIDS awareness worldwide.
This charity organises an annual Freddie impersonation contest on 5th September, which was Mercury’s birthday. He would have been 65 this year. You can buy a costume and accessories (including that famous moustache), or make your own. The idea is to raise money for the trust, which will then redistribute it to local charities worldwide. There are look-alike competitions, or you could hold a Freddie party where everybody dresses up, or even convince a gaggle of friends to don the togs and take to the streets to encourage donations. Me? I’ve got my singlet on and my moustache is growing as I type.
A word of advice though: if you’re planning a karaoke party, please remember that not everybody has a four-octave singing range.
Freddie For A Day is a celebration of the life of Freddie Mercury which falls around his birthday date. It is meant to engage members of the public in a fun way to remember one of our greatest artists, but behind it is the earnest purpose of raising funds to support the continued work in fighting HIV AIDS worldwide through the Mercury Phoenix Trust, the HIV AIDS charitable organisation set up in Freddie’s memory after his passing almost 20 years ago.
