Trivia

He used a piano as a headboard for his bed and taught himself to play the piano backwards so if a song idea popped into his head when lying in bed, he could reach backwards and play it or record it.

He had a vocal range of 4 octaves.

Queen's performance at Live Aid (1985) was voted the "World's Greatest Concert" in a 2005 poll for Channel 4 in the U.K. The historic gig fought off competition from Jimi Hendrix's 1969 Woodstock show in second place and Sex Pistols' raucous show at the Manchester Free Trade Hall in 1976.

He wrote the Queen song "Love of my Life" about Mary Austin.

He penned the hits "Killer Queen", "Bohemian Rhapsody", "Somebody To Love", and "Crazy Little Thing Called Love". He wrote "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" in the bathtub.

Mercury is the second most impersonated rock and roll performer in the UK after Elvis Presley.

In 2007, over 2,400 music fans were asked by O2 to vote for their dream supergroup. They chose Mercury as lead singer, Jimi Hendrix on lead guitar, Elton John on piano and Phil Collins on drums.

While buried in the Zoroastrian tradition, Freddie, himself, seldom practiced the family religion.

Mercury recorded "The Show Must Go On" two months before his death to AIDS. Barely being able to stand because of his illness, Brian May told Mercury that he would sing the vocals for him. Mercury refused, mustered all of his strength, and sang his first take perfectly.

He disliked giving interviews and rarely spoke to the press. He only trusted a select group of journalists.

He chose not to to get corrective oral surgery to fix his famous overbite (caused by the presence of four extra teeth which pushed his incisors out). He commented early in his career that he wished to have work done on his teeth, but regretted that he didn't have time to do it out of fear that it would damage his voice. Also, chose not to have surgery to remove polyps on his vocal cords for the same reason. Ironically, Freddie was a smoker.

He loved his cats, and dedicated his solo-album "Mr. Bad Guy" to them. When he was out touring, he used to phone his cats and talk to them for hours. On one of his waistcoats, he has painted portraits of all of his cats.

After a revolution in Zanzibar, he and his family were forced to flee to England, where he pursued a Diploma in Art and Graphic Design. This knowledge was to come in useful when he designed Queen's famous crest.

Because the United Kingdom forbids the Zoroastrian practice of deposing remains by having birds eat them, Freddie Mercury had his remains cremated and put in the custody of Mary Austin to keep in a location of whose knowledge she is the sole possessor.

He designed Queen's famous crest using his and his fellow band mates' birth signs: Two lions for Roger and John (Leo), a crab for Brian (Cancer), and two fairies for himself (Virgo).

The song "Delilah" was written about his favorite cat.

His ancestors, the Parsees, originated in Persia and fled to India in the 7th century. The reason being they are Zoroastrians and did not want to get converted to Islam.

There is a breed of yellow rose named after him.

His baby photo won photograph of the year in 1947 in his hometown.

In his will, Mercury left the vast majority of his wealth (including his mansion home and recording royalties) to Mary Austin a woman he had a close friendship with (and once had a relationship with). The remainder was left to his parents and sister. He also left £500,000 to his chef Joe Fanelli, £500,000 to his personal assistant Peter Freestone, £100,000 to his driver Terry Giddings, and £500,000 to his partner Jim Hutton.

Queen won the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution in 1990. All four members of the band came to the stage to accept the award. It was Mercury's last appearance in front of an audience.

Every year between Christmas Day and New Year's, starting 10am at Christmas Day and ending at 23:59 on New Year's Eve, a Dutch radio station called Radio 2 has an annual Top 2000 Songs, playing all of these 2000 songs one after another without breaks. Everyone listening can vote a week in advance for their favorite songs and the eventual list is based on these votes. From the 19 editions of the Top 2000, Bohemian Rhapsody from Mercury's Queen came in 1st 15 times making it the ultimate winner.

While living in Asia, he listened to many Indian artists but also listened to Cliff Richard and The Shadows. Upon arriving in England, in common with the other members of Queen, he became influenced by acts like The Beatles, Jimi Hendrix and Led Zeppelin.

Following the announcement of his death, tributes came from some of the biggest names in the British music industry. David Bowie said: "We'll all miss him a lot. Together with his band Queen he made a great contribution to popular music." George Michael said: "Freddie Mercury was a huge source of inspiration to me as a child. I religiously attended Queen's concerts year after year. This is a sad day." Phil Collins said: "This is a great tragedy. I had the greatest admiration and a lot of affection for him." Elton John said: "Freddie Mercury was an incredible, innovative singer and frontman for a band. He was a very dear friend of mine and it was a privilege to have known him for some of his life. He was very funny, he was extremely outrageous, he was very kind and he was a great musician and one of the great frontmen of rock and roll bands." In a concert the next day, Sting dedicated his song "Shadows in the Rain" to Mercury.

He was an avid and fastidious philatelist (stamp collector). His extensive collection is still exhibited at stamp shows world-wide as being under the estate of his birth name.

He once gave the actor Dustin Hoffman a guided tour of his mansion as Hoffman was thinking of hiring the same designer, Robin Moore-Ede, to renovate an old house he had bought in London.

Freddie and Eric Carr, second drummer for KISS, passed away within hours of each other on the very same day of November 24, 1991. Mercury died from AIDS. Eric died from cancer, which led to a brain hemorrhage.

He was of Persian descent. His ancestors were Persians who fled to India.

Aretha Franklin was one of his favorite singers.

He had the habit of calling people "darling".

Queen won the 1992 Brit Award for British Single for their song "These Are The Days of Our Lives" and Mercury was the posthumous winner of the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution. Only John Lennon, Paul McCartney and Sting have also managed to win the Outstanding Contribution Award as both a member of a band and as an individual.

In 1973, while Queen were recording their first album, Freddie Mercury released a single under the name Larry Lurex. The name is a pun of glam rock star Gary Glitter's name and the metallic yarn Lurex. The songs on the single were covers of The Beach Boys "I Can Hear Music" and The Byrds "Goin' Back".

He was a huge fan of actress and Broadway star Liza Minnelli.

His favorite movies were Some Like It Hot (1959), George Cukor's The Women (1939) and Imitation of Life (1959) with Lana Turner.

He attended many operas and released a semi-classical album with Spanish opera diva Montserrat Caballé.

In September 2010, he was named as "The Greatest Rock Legend Of All Time" in a poll for OnePoll.com, beating the King of Rock N'Roll, Elvis Presley, into second place.

When the rock group Smile (formed by Brian May with Roger Taylor and Tim Stafell) split, Freddie joined Brian and Roger to form Queen.

His song "Bohemian Rhapsody" (1975) was named Britain's favourite pop single of all time on 2002 in a poll by Guinness World Records (GWR). More than 31,000 people voted in the poll for GWR's "British Hit Singles" book.

He achieved grade IV in practical piano and theory. Despite being a classically trained pianist, he admitted in an interview (Melody Maker, 2 May 1981) that he could read "very little" sheet music. His classical training influenced some of his compositions for Queen, especially in the early years of the band.

He was survived by Jim Hutton, his partner since 1985.

His band Queen was awarded a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for Recording at 6356 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood, California.

He was voted the No.1 'Greatest Singer In Rock' by Classic Rock magazine (May 2009/Issue 131).

He was inducted into the International Mustache Hall of Fame in 2015 (inaugural class) in the category Music & Arts.

He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2001 as a member of Queen.

He released his first solo album, "Mr. Bad Guy", in early 1985. Although it is often remembered now as a flop (and described as such by Queen's manager), it actually performed reasonably well in the UK, where it peaked at number six and stayed on the chart for 23 weeks, making it ultimately the most successful Queen solo project.

He was a staunch supporter of the British monarchy and named the band Queen as both a reference to this and for the word's sexual innuendo.

It is generally accepted that he was diagnosed as HIV positive in the spring of 1987. One of the main criticisms leveled at the biopic Bohemian Rhapsody (2018) was that it changed this to immediately before Live Aid (1985) for dramatic effect.

He was the son of Bomi and Jer Bulsara.

He was educated at St. Peter's boarding school near Bombay, India, where he had his first musical training (grade four piano, both in practical and theory) and also his first experience of performing onstage, with his band, the Hectics. It was at St. Peter's where he picked up the name 'Freddie', soon even his parents addressed him by that name.

On 19 July 1986, he sang a duet of "Tutti Frutti" with Marillion front man Fish at the Mungersdorfer Stadion, Cologne, West Germany.