Freddie Mercury

2020 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Author(s):  
Nick Braae

Rock and Rhapsodies is the first book-length musicological study of British rock band Queen. It primarily addresses the material written, recorded, and released between 1973 and 1991. The text provides readers with a nuanced analytical account of the group’s songs and illuminates the varied stylistic and historical contexts in which Queen’s music was created. The key conceptual basis for the analysis is an idiolect, which refers to the distinct musical style of a single artist. Having documented the key features of Queen’s idiolect, the book further explores the nature of specific musical characteristic and uses them to respond to a range of wider analytical and discursive issues as pertaining to style, genre, form, time, voice, and historiography. Rock and Rhapsodies comprises twelve chapters. The introduction documents Queen’s place in scholarly literature and unfolds the principal analytical methodology. The following three chapters address the structural details of Queen’s idiolect and songs, before analysing the voices of Queen’s singers. The vocal techniques are related to discourses of authenticity and, in the case of Freddie Mercury, the queer voice. The five subsequent chapters identify the changing and myriad stylistic influences on Queen, as well as relate the band to the major rock movements of the 1970s: hard, glam, and progressive. The final chapter explores the replacement singers, Queen in wider popular media, and the influence of the band, since Mercury’s death in 1991.


2017 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 23912 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adriana Amaral ◽  
Camila Monteiro ◽  
Thiago Soares
Keyword(s):  

A partir da apresentação ao vivo do grupo Queen, na edição 2015 do Rock in Rio, quando a banda inglesa de rock contou com um ex-integrante de reality show musical como vocalista, traça-se uma observação de controvérsias para pensar de que maneira as questões de gênero, com foco nas masculinidades, podem ser importantes ferramentas para pensar a construção do valor na música pop. A problemática trata das diferentes performances do masculino dos dois vocalistas (Freddie Mercury, o cantor original da banda, e Adam Lambert, no Rock in Rio 2015), evidenciando lugares distintos nas corporalidades da música pop, bem como a noção de trajetória como um aparato capaz de evocar princípios de autenticidade para os artistas. O procedimento metodológico foi a observação da performance a partir de três categorias de controvérsias: origens, gêneros musicais e corpos. A coleta de dados foi feita a partir da observação do YouTube, Twitter e de blogs LGBT. Como resultado inicial, indicamos que a governabilidade dos corpos numa performance, necessariamente, precisa reencenar outras performances; passando pela dicotomia em torno da presença numa atualização do ritual performático no qual noções como arquivo e repertório – propostas por Diana Taylor (2013) – são importantes para discutir as inúmeras possibilidades de tensões e controvérsias nesses espetáculos.


Author(s):  
Mónica Muñoz Sobrino ◽  
Carmen Pereira Domínguez
Keyword(s):  

Es el momento en que la banda Queen inicia su intervención en el memorable concierto de rock Live Aid para combatir el hambre en Etiopía, celebrado el 13 de julio de 1985, en el estadio Wembley de Londres; recital considerado como el mejor hasta la fecha y la actuación de Queen, con un Mercury glorioso, ante un espléndido escenario, calificada como la actuación más brillante de la historia del rock. Un flashback nos remonta a los orígenes del grupo y nos guía por la trayectoria vital de su líder, Freddie Mercury.Como dicen los protagonistas, Queen es un grupo de inadaptados que toca para inadaptados. Pero también es la familia que apoya incondicionalmente, sin juzgar, y que alienta la creatividad liberadora de sus miembros. A través de la música de Queen reviviremos las luces y las sombras de las décadas de 1970 y 1980, y entenderemos las circunstancias sociales que fraguaron el “mejor grupo británico de todos los tiempos” (título otorgado tras un sondeo realizado por la emisora BBC Radio 2 en 2007). (*) Recomendación bibliográfica: A. Casas. (2018). Freddie Mercury. Una biografía. Barcelona: Penguin Random House Editorial.


2014 ◽  
Vol 30 (3) ◽  
pp. 239-240 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Grainger
Keyword(s):  
The Real ◽  

When the late Freddie Mercury penned these words (1), perhaps he had in mind bringing innovative medicines and devices to patients more quickly.


2016 ◽  
Vol 42 (1) ◽  
pp. 29-38 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christian T. Herbst ◽  
Stellan Hertegard ◽  
Daniel Zangger-Borch ◽  
Per-Åke Lindestad

2021 ◽  
pp. 107-138
Author(s):  
Nick Braae

This chapter analyses and interprets the singing of Freddie Mercury. It is argued that the singer utilised four predominant voice types—powerful, gritty, sincere, exaggerated—which were defined by combinations of vocal techniques. These voice types often aligned with stylistic contexts but were also utilised to emphasise the structural dynamics of songs, such as moving from a lighter tone (e.g. sincere) to a powerful tone at the onset of a pre-chorus. Furthermore, Mercury’s deployment of these voice types in incongruous stylistic contexts (e.g. a breathy tone in a hard rock song), along with the ambiguity as to whether he possessed a ‘true’ voice, may be read as queer vocal strategies that challenge heteronormative conventions of male rock singing. It is argued that his vocal aesthetic was influenced by Liza Minnelli and Marilyn Monroe—theatrical voices—which underscores his ability to present a distinct performance identity.


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