Name	Roy Thomas Baker
Alias	RTB
Background	non_performing_personnel
Origin	United Kingdom
Genre	Pop, Rock, Power pop, Alternative rock, New Wave, Hard rock, Glam metal, Glam rock
Years active	1970s–present
Label	Decca, Trident, EMI, Parlophone, Elektra, Hollywood Records, RTB Audio-Visual Productions, Warner Brothers Records
Associated acts	Queen, The Smashing Pumpkins, The Cars, The Darkness
Website	www.roythomasbaker.com }}

Roy Thomas Baker (born November 10, 1946, in Hampstead, London, England) is a multiple award-winning Anglo-American music producer, songwriter, arranger and Recording Academy Governor, who has produced Platinum and Gold certified pop and rock records from the 1970s to the present.

Career

Baker began his career at Decca Records in England at the age of 14. Encouraged by music producer Gus Dudgeon he soon moved to Trident Studios, where he worked with music producer greats Gus Dudgeon, Tony Visconti, Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, Frank Zappa as well as recording artist The Rolling Stones, David Bowie, The Who, Gasolin', Nazareth, Santana, Mothers Of Invention, Be Bop Deluxe, Free and T.Rex.

After co-founding Neptune (Trident's record company), Baker met a band that would eventually be known as Queen. He began a working relationship that lasted for five albums and a number of awards – including a Grammy and The Guinness World Records Prize for the best single, ''Bohemian Rhapsody''.

Following his successes with Queen and other artists Baker signed a multi album production deal with CBS Music (Columbia Records,Sony music,Epic Records etc.). He then proceeded to move to the U.S. and set up offices in New York and Los Angeles. At this time under his new CBS deal RTB produced Journey, Starcastle, Reggie Knighton (The Grass Roots), Ian Hunter and Ronnie Wood (The Rolling Stones).

Baker, also at this time, committed to produce four albums for The Cars after being prompted by Elektra Records to see them perform in a Boston school gymnasium. The albums were certified platinum and The Cars were Grammy nominated.

He was offered the post as The Senior Vice President of "Artist and Repertoire" (A and R) for Elektra Records as executive and/or producer with recording artists The World, Lindsey Buckingham, Motley Crue, Joe Lynn Turner, Josie Cotton and Dokken as well as continuing with Queen and The Cars. During his tenure as Sr.V.P. Elektra signed artists Metallica, Simply Red, Yello, Peter Schillng, The World and 10,000 Maniacs.

Baker has also worked with artists such as Guns N' Roses, Alice Cooper, Foreigner, Pilot, Ozzy Osbourne, Devo, The Stranglers, Dusty Springfield, T'Pau, Yes, Cheap Trick and Lewis Furey. In 2005 he produced ''One Way Ticket to Hell and Back'' by The Darkness, The Smashing Pumpkins' 2007 album, ''Zeitgeist'', The Storm (band) 2008 album "When The Storm Meets The Ground", The Smashing Pumpkins "American Gothic" and One Karma's 2011 album "Life Got In The Way".

In the Spring of 2011, he mixed and performed additional production at The Village Recorder for the forthcoming Maximilian is King ''Songs to Kill Yourself With'' album.

Personal life

Baker lives in Los Angeles, Europe and at his recording compound in Arizona. He is married to entertainment executive and former actress (The Godfather) Tere Baker.

Selected discography

Productions by Roy Thomas Baker:

Arnold Corns A.K.A. David Bowie "Man in the Middle"(1971 - released 1985)

Free: "Fire and Water" (1971)

Nazareth: "Nazareth" (1971)

Nazareth: "Exercises" (1972)

Gasolin': ''Gasolin' 3'' (1973)

Gasolin': "Gasolin' Stakkels Jim" (in English: "Poor Jim") (1974)

Queen: ''Queen'' (1973) (Credited as Roy Baker)

Queen: ''Queen II'' (1974)

Man : ''Rhinos, Winos and Lunatics'' (1974)

Queen: ''Sheer Heart Attack'' (1974)

Queen: ''A Night at the Opera'' (1975)

Jet: Jet (1975)

Be Bop Deluxe: ''Futurama'' (1975)

Gasolin': ''Gas 5'' (1975)

Lewis Furey: ''The Humours Of'' (1976)

Pilot: ''Morin Heights'' (1976)

Ian Hunter: ''Overnight Angels (1976)

Gasolin': ''Efter endnu en dag'' (1976)

Dusty Springfield ''It Begins Again'' (1978)

The Cars: ''The Cars'' (1978)

Queen: ''Jazz'' (1978)

Journey: Infinity'' (1978)

Journey: Evolution'' (1979)

Yes: ''Golden Age Sessions'' (1979)

Ron Wood: ''Gimme Some Neck'' (1979)

The Cars: ''Candy-O'' (1979)

Foreigner: "Head Games" (1979)

Alice Cooper: ''Flush the Fashion'' (1980)

The Cars: ''Panorama'' (1980)

The Cars: ''Shake It Up'' (1981)

Heavy Metal: "Motion Picture Soundtrack" (1982)

Devo: ''Oh, No! It's Devo'' (1982)

Cheap Trick: ''One on One'' (1982)

Fast Times at Ridgemont High: "Motion Picture Soundtrack" (1983)

Mötley Crüe: ''Too Fast for Love'' (1983)

Joe Lynn Turner: ''Rescue You'' (1985)

Jon Anderson: ''3 Ships'' (1985)

American Anthem:"Motion Picture Soundtrack" (1986)

T'Pau: ''Bridge of Spies'' (titled ''T'Pau'' in the USA) (1987)

Slade: ''You Boyz Make Big Noize'' (1987)

Ozzy Osbourne: ''No Rest for the Wicked'' (1988)

The Stranglers: ''10'' (1989)

Chris De Burgh: "Spark to a Flame" (1990)

Shy: ''Misspent Youth'' (1990)

Dangerous Toys: ''Hellacious Acres'' (1991)

The Stranglers: "All Twelve Inches" (1992)

Wayne's World: "Motion Picture Soundtrack" (1992)

Mozart: "Mozart" (1994)

Mozart: "Eve" (1995)

Mozart: "Paris Is Dying..." (1996)

Local H: "Pack Up the Cats" (1998)

Hawkwind: "Hall of the Mountain Grill" (2001)

Split Shift: ''Tension'' (2004)

The Darkness (band): ''One Way Ticket to Hell... and Back'' (2005)

Elliot Easton (The Cars): ''Change No Change'' (2006)

The Smashing Pumpkins: ''Zeitgeist'' (2007)

Robert Calvert: ''Captain Lockheed and the Starfighters'' (2007)

Transformers: "Motion Picture Soundtrack" (2007)

The Storm: ''Where The Storm Meets The Ground'' (2008)

The Smashing Pumpkins: ''American Gothic'' (2008)

Guns N' Roses: ''Chinese Democracy'' (2008)

This: ''Great Civilizations'' (2010)

One Karma: Life Got In The Way (2011)

Maximilian is King: Songs to Kill Yourself With (2011)

See also

:Category:Albums produced by Roy Thomas Baker

References

External links

Official Website

@RoyThomasBaker on Twitter

Roy Thomas Baker - Flixster Movie Profile.

Roy Thomas Baker-IMDB Movie Profile.

Roy Thomas Baker (RTB)'s Linked (IN) Professional Profile.

An Invitation to the Opera, Sound on Sound, October 1995 - interview with Baker

Mix interview with Roy Thomas Baker by Rick Clark, April 1, 1999.

Mix interview with Roy Thomas Baker by Paul Tingen, March 1, 2006.

Category:English record producers Category:Living people Category:People from London Category:1946 births

ca:Roy Thomas Baker da:Roy Thomas Baker de:Roy Thomas Baker es:Roy Thomas Baker it:Roy Thomas Baker hu:Roy Thomas Baker no:Roy Thomas Baker pl:Roy Thomas Baker ru:Бейкер, Рой Томас fi:Roy Thomas Baker sv:Roy Thomas Baker

birth place	Missouri
nationality	American
write	y
edit	y
notable works	''the Avengers''''Alter Ego''''Conan'' ''Invaders'' ''Uncanny X-Men''''Ghost Rider''''Iron Fist''''All-Star Squadron''''Arak, Son of Thunder''''Infinity, Inc.''''Secret Origins''''Young All-Stars''
awards	Alley Award, 1969Shazam Award, 1971, 1973, 1974
sortkey	Thomas, Roy
subcat	American
dob	22
mob	11
yob	1940 }}

Roy William Thomas, Jr. (born November 22, 1940,) is an American comic book writer and editor, and Stan Lee's first successor as editor-in-chief of Marvel Comics. He is possibly best known for introducing the pulp magazine hero Conan the Barbarian to American comics, with a series that added to the storyline of Robert E. Howard's character and helped launch a sword and sorcery trend in comics. Thomas is also known for his championing of Golden Age comic-book heroes — particularly the 1940s superhero team the Justice Society of America — and for lengthy writing stints on Marvel's ''X-Men'' and ''Avengers'', and DC Comics' ''All-Star Squadron'', among other titles.

Early life

Thomas was born in Missouri, United States. As a child, Thomas was a devoted comic book fan, and in grade school he wrote and drew his own comics for distribution to friends and family. The first of these was All-Giant Comics, which he recalls as having featured such characters as Elephant Giant. He graduated from Southeast Missouri State University in 1961 with a B.S. in Education, having majored in history and social science, and then worked for four years as a teacher.

Thomas became an early and active member of Silver Age comic book fandom when it organized in the early 1960s — primarily around Dr. Jerry Bails, whose enthusiasm for the rebirth of superhero comics during that period led Bails to found the fanzine ''Alter Ego'', an early focal point of fandom. Thomas, then a high school English teacher, was an enthusiastic contributor to ''AE'', and took over as editor in 1964 when Bails moved on to other pursuits. Letters from him appeared regularly in the letters pages of both DC and Marvel Comics, including ''The Flash'' 116 (Nov. 1960), and ''Fantastic Four'' 22 (Jan. 1964) (in which a letter by Dave Cockrum also appears).

Career

Marvel Comics

In 1965, Thomas moved to New York City to take a job at DC Comics as assistant to Mort Weisinger, then the editor of the Superman titles. Thomas said he had just accepted a fellowship to study foreign relations at George Washington University when he received a letter from Weisinger, "with whom I had exchanged one or two letters, tops", asking Thomas to become "his assistant editor on a several-week trial basis." Thomas had already written a ''Jimmy Olsen'' script "a few months before, while still living and teaching in the St. Louis area," he said in 2005. "I worked at DC for eight days in late June and very early July of 1965" before accepting a job at Marvel Comics.

This came after his chafing under the notoriously difficult Weisinger, to a point, Thomas said in 1981, that he would go "home to my dingy little room at, coincidentally, the George Washington Hotel in Manhattan, during that second week, and actually feeling tears well into my eyes, at the ripe old age of 24." Familiar with editor and chief writer Stan Lee's Marvel work, and feeling them "the most vital comics around, Thomas "just sat down one night at the hotel and — I wrote him a letter! Not applying for a job or anything so mundane as that — I just said that I admired his work, and would like to buy him a drink some time. I figured he just might remember me from ''Alter Ego''." Lee did, and phoned Thomas to offer him a Marvel writing test.

The writer's test, Thomas said in 1998, "was four Jack Kirby pages from ''Fantastic Four Annual'' #2 ... [Stan Lee] had Sol [Brodsky] or someone take out the dialogue. It was just black-and-white. Other people like Denny O'Neil and Gary Friedrich took it. But soon afterwards we stopped using it." Thomas was at DC the next day, proofreading a Supergirl story, when Steinberg called to have Thomas meet with Lee during lunch and agreed to work for Marvel. He returned to DC to give "indefinite notice" to Weisinger, but Weisinger ordered him to leave immediately and "I was back at Marvel less than an hour after I first left, and had a ''Modeling with Millie'' assignment to do over the weekend. It was a Friday."

To that point, editor-in-chief Lee had been the main scripter of Marvel publications, with his brother, Larry Lieber, picking up the slack as a sometime-scripter of Lee-plotted stories. Thomas soon became the first new Marvel writer to sustain a presence, at a time when comics veterans such as Robert Bernstein, Ernie Hart, Leon Lazarus, and Don Rico, and fellow newcomers Steve Skeates (hired a couple of weeks earlier) and O'Neil (brought in at Thomas' recommendation a few months later) did not.

His Marvel debut was the romantic-adventure story "Whom Can I Turn To?" in the ''Millie the Model'' spin-off ''Modeling with Millie'' #44 (Dec. 1965) — for which the credits and the logo were inadvertently left off due to a production glitch, resulting in this being left off most credit lists. Thomas' first Marvel superhero scripting was "My Life for Yours", the "Iron Man" feature in ''Tales of Suspense'' #73 (Jan. 1966), working from a Lee plot as well as a plot assist from secretary Steinberg. Thomas estimates that Lee rewrote approximately half of that fledgling attempt.

Thomas' earliest Marvel work also included the teen-romance title ''Patsy and Hedy'' #104-105 (Feb.-April 1966), and two "Doctor Strange" stories, plotted by Lee and Steve Ditko, in ''Strange Tales'' #143-144 (April–May 1966). Two previously written freelance stories for Charlton Comics also saw print: "The Second Trojan War" in ''Son of Vulcan'' #50 (Jan. 1966) and "The Eye of Horus" in ''Blue Beetle'' #54 (March 1966). "When Stan saw the couple of Charlton stories I'd written earlier in more of a Gardner Fox style, he wasn't too impressed," Thomas recalled. "It's probably a good thing I already had my job at Marvel at that point! I think I was the right person in the right place at the right time, but there are other people who, had they been there, might have been just as right."

Thomas took on what would be his first long-term Marvel title, the World War II series ''Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos'', starting with #29 (April 1966) and continuing through #41 (April 1967) and the series' 1966 annual, ''Sgt. Fury Special'' #2. He also began writing the mutant-superteam title ''[Uncanny] X-Men'' from #20-43 (May 1966 - April 1968), and, finally, took over ''The Avengers'', starting with #35 (Dec. 1966), and continuing until 1972. That notable run was marked by a strong sense of continuity, and stories that ranged from the personal to the cosmic — the latter most prominently with the Kree-Skrull War in issues #89-97 (June 1971 - March 1972). Additional work included an occasional "Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D" and "Doctor Strange" story in ''Strange Tales''. When that title became the solo comic ''Doctor Strange'', he wrote the entire run of new stories, from #169-183 (June 1968 - Nov. 1969), mostly with the art team of penciler Gene Colan and inker Tom Palmer.

As Thomas self-evaluated in a 1981 interview, shortly after leaving Marvel for rival DC Comics, "One of the reasons Stan liked my writing ... was that after a few issues he felt he could trust me enough that he virtually never again read anything I wrote — well, at least not more than a page or two in a row, just to keep me honest."

Thomas eloped in July 1968 to marry his first wife, Jean Maxey, returning to work a day late from a weekend comic-book convention in St. Louis, Missouri. Thomas said in 2000 that Brodsky, in the interim, had assigned ''Doctor Strange'' to the writer Archie Goodwin, newly ensconced at Marvel and writing ''Iron Man'', but Thomas convinced Brodsky to return it to him. "I got very possessive about ''Doctor Strange''," Thomas recalled. "It wasn't a huge seller, but [by the time it was canceled], we were selling in the low 40 percent range of more than 400,000 print run, so it was actually selling a couple hundred thousand copies [but] at the time you needed to sell even more." He eventually did have a Caribbean honeymoon, where he scripted the wedding of Hank Pym and Janet Van Dyne in ''The Avengers'' #60 (Jan.1969). Thomas, who had turned over ''X-Men'' to other writers, returned with issue #56 (May 1969) when the series was on the verge of cancellation. While efforts to save it failed — the title ended its initial run with #66 — Thomas' collaboration with artist Neal Adams through #63 (Dec. 1969) is regarded as a Silver Age creative highlight. Thomas won the 1969 Alley Award that year for Best Writer, while Adams and inker Tom Palmer, netted 1969 Alley Awards for Best Pencil Artist and Best Inking Artist, respectively.

In 1971, with Stan Lee and Gerry Conway, Thomas created Man-Thing and wrote the first Man-Thing story in color comics, after Conway and Len Wein introduced the character in the black-and-white comics magazine ''Savage Tales''. Thomas was also responsible for the creation and 'recreation' of many of the memorable Marvel cult favorite superheroes and villains, namely the Vision, Yellowjacket, Adam Warlock, Doc Samson, the Defenders, the Invaders, Ms Marvel, Valkyrie, Thundra, Ultron/Adamantium, the Whitman Black Knight,Morbius, Kulan Gath, among others, and was key in blending fictional concepts from mythology, fantasy and horror into the Marvel universe. These included Jack Kirby's Eternals and Mary Shelley's Frankenstein.

Editor-in-chief

The following year, when Lee became Marvel's publisher, Thomas succeeded him as editor-in-chief. Thomas by this time had already launched ''Conan the Barbarian'', an initially low-selling surprise success due to Thomas' accessible adaptations and original stories, combined with the detailed, Beaux Arts-inspired illustrations of Barry Windsor-Smith. Thomas, who stepped down from his editorship in August 1974, wrote hundreds of Conan stories in a host of Marvel comics and black-and-white magazines. During that time, he and Smith used R.E. Howards' little known sword-wielding woman-warrior Red Sonja, initially as a Conan supporting character.

Thomas also continued to script mainstream titles, including Marvel's flagships, ''The Fantastic Four'' and ''The Amazing Spider-Man''. He launched such new titles as the unusual "non-team" series ''The Defenders'', as well as ''What If'', a title that explored alternate histories. In addition, he indulged his love of Golden Age comic-book heroes in the World War II-set superhero series ''The Invaders.'' Thomas also helped create such new characters as the superpowered martial artist Iron Fist, the supernatural Brother Voodoo, and the demonic, motorcycle-driving Ghost Rider; had a behind-the-scenes role in creating the revamped X-Men team that would emerge as an eventual blockbuster; and was instrumental in engineering Marvel's comic-book adaptation of the movie ''Star Wars'', without which, 1980s editor Jim Shooter believed, "[W]e would have gone out of business".

DC Comics and later career

In 1981, after several years of freelancing for Marvel and a dispute with then editor-in-chief Jim Shooter, Thomas signed a three-year exclusivity writing/editing contract with DC. He marked his return to DC with a two part ''Green Lantern'' story, and briefly wrote ''Batman'', ''DC Comics Presents'', and the ''Legion of Super-Heroes''. DC gave Thomas' work a major promotional push by featuring several of his series in free, 16-page insert previews. Thomas married his second wife Danette Couto in May 1981. Danette legally changed her first name to Dann and would become Roy's regular writing partner. Roy credits her with the original idea for the ''Arak, Son of Thunder'' series drawn by Ernie Colón. Gerry Conway would also be a frequent collaborator with Roy Thomas. Together they wrote a two-part Superman-Captain Marvel team-up in ''DC Comics Presents'', a series of ''Atari Force'' and ''Swordquest'' mini-comics packaged with Atari 2600 video games, and three Justice League-Justice Society crossovers. Conway also contributed ideas to the funny animal comic ''Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew!'' created by Thomas and Scott Shaw. Thomas and Conway were to be the co-writers of the ''JLA/Avengers'' intercompany crossover but editorial disputes between DC and Marvel caused the project's cancellation. As a solo writer, Roy Thomas wrote ''Wonder Woman'' and, with artist Gene Colan, updated the character's costume and introduced a new supervillainess, the Silver Swan.

Thomas realized a childhood dream in writing the Justice Society of America (JSA). Reviving the Golden Age group in ''Justice League of America'' #193 and continuing in ''All-Star Squadron'', he wrote retro adventures, like those of The Invaders, set in World War II. In addition to the JSA's high-profile heroes, Thomas revived such characters as Liberty Belle, Johnny Quick, the Shining Knight, Robotman, Firebrand, the Tarantula, and Neptune Perkins. He used the series to address the complicated and sometimes contradictory continuity issues surrounding the JSA.

In 1984, Thomas and artist Jerry Ordway launched a JSA spin-off, ''Infinity Inc.'', set in the present day and depicting the adventures of the JSA's children. After Ordway's departure from the series, Thomas' other artistic collaborators included Don Newton, Todd McFarlane, and Michael Bair. Thomas wrote several limited series for DC including ''America vs. the Justice Society'', ''Jonni Thunder a.k.a. Thunderbolt'', ''Shazam! The New Beginning'', and ''Crimson Avenger''. From 1986 to 1988, Thomas was a major contributor to the ''Secret Origins'' series and wrote most of the stories involving the Golden Age characters. The ''Young All-Stars'' replaced ''All-Star Squadron'' following the changes to DC's continuity brought about by the ''Crisis on Infinite Earths'' limited series. Thomas's last major project for DC was an adaptation of Richard Wagner's ''Ring cycle'' drawn by Gil Kane and published in 1989-1990. Since then, Thomas has written a trio of Elseworlds one-shots combining DC characters with classic cinema and literature: ''Superman's Metropolis'', ''Superman: War of the Worlds'', and ''JLA: The Island of Dr. Moreau''.

Thomas and Gerry Conway collaborated on the screenplays for two movies: the animated feature ''Fire and Ice'' (1983) and ''Conan the Destroyer'' (1984).

By 1987 following Jim Shooter's departure from Marvel Comics, Thomas returned to Marvel, scripting titles starring Doctor Strange, Thor, the Avengers West Coast, and Conan, now often co-scripting with his wife, Dann Thomas, or with Jean-Marc Lofficier.

During the 1990s, Thomas began working less for Marvel and DC than for independent companies. He wrote issues of the TV-series tie-ins ''Xena: Warrior Princess'' and ''Hercules: The Legendary Journeys'' for Topps Comics, Additionally, he began writing more for other media, including television, and relaunched ''Alter Ego'' as a formal magazine published by TwoMorrows Publishing in 1999. In 2005, he earned a Master's degree in Humanities from California State University. As of 2008, he lives in South Carolina, and is co-chairman of the board of directors of the comic-book industry charity The Hero Initiative.

In 2004, Thomas and artist Dick Giordano completed an adaptation of Bram Stoker's ''Dracula'' novel. They had begun the project in 1974 but the cancellation of many of Marvel's black and white magazines put it into limbo. The finished story was collected into a hardcover edition in 2005 and a colorized hardcover edition in 2010. ''Anthem'', a comic book series by Thomas and artists Daniel Acuña, Jorge Santamaria Garcia and Benito Gallego, about World War II superheroes in an alternate reality, began publication by Heroic Publishing in January 2006. Thomas returned to Red Sonja in 2006, writing the one-shot ''Red Sonja Monster Island'' for Dynamite Comics. In 2007 Thomas wrote a Black Knight story for the four-issue miniseries, ''Mystic Arcana''.

Awards

1969: Alley Award for Best Writer.

1971: Shazam Award for Best Writer (Dramatic Division)

1973: Shazam Award for Best Individual Story ("Song of Red Sonja", with artist Barry Smith, in ''Conan the Barbarian'' #24)

1974: Shazam for Superior Achievement by an Individual

1974: Angoulême International Comics Festival Award for Best Foreign Author

1977: Favourite Comicbook Writer at the Eagle Awards

1977: nominated for Favourite Single Comicbook Story at the Eagle Awards for ''Fantastic Four'' #176: "Improbable as it may seem the Impossible Man is back in Town" with George Pérez

1978: nominated for Favourite Writer at the Eagle Awards

1978: nominated for Favourite Continued Story at the Eagle Awards for ''Star Wars'' #1-6 with George Lucas and Howard Chaykin

1979: nominated for Best Comic Book Writer (US) at the Eagle Awards

1979: nominated for Best Continued Story at the Eagle Awards for ''Thor'' #272-278 with John Buscema

1980: Roll of Honour at the Eagle Awards

1996: Author That We Loved at the Haxtur Awards

2011: Eisner Awards Hall of Fame

Footnotes

References

Roy Thomas at the Grand Comics Database

Roy Thomas at the Internet Movie Database

External links

Roy Thomas interview, ''Comic Book Artist'' #13, May 2001. WebCitation archive.

Category:People from Missouri Category:People from South Carolina Category:Living people Category:1940 births

bg:Рой Томас de:Roy Thomas es:Roy Thomas fr:Roy Thomas it:Roy Thomas no:Roy Thomas pt:Roy Thomas ru:Томас, Рой sc:Roy Thomas

Thomas Baker or Tom Baker may refer to:

Australian people

Thomas Baker (aviator) (1897–1918), Australian soldier and aviator of the First World War

British people

Tom Baker (born 1934), actor who played ''Doctor Who'' from 1974 to 1981

Thomas Baker (antiquarian) (1656–1740), English antiquarian

Thomas Baker (artist) (1809–1864), English landscape painter and watercolourist

Thomas Baker (attorney) (c. 1680–1749), English attorney and author of ''Fine Lady's Airs''

Thomas Baker (cricketer), cricketer who played for Yorkshire County Cricket Club and Northamptonshire County Cricket Club

Tom Baker (footballer), Wales international football player

Thomas Baker (musician), composer and producer of musical stage productions

Thomas Baker (Peasants' Revolt leader)

Thomas Baker (Royal Navy officer) (1771-1845), Royal Navy admiral

Thomas Durand Baker (1837-1893), Quartermaster-General to the Forces

Thomas Baker (missionary), Christian missionary cannibalised in Fiji in 1876

Thomas George Adames Baker (1920–2000), Anglican clergyman

Thomas Baker (mathematician)

Thomas Baker (dramatist)

American people

Tom Baker (American actor) (1940–1982)

Tom Baker (bowler) (born 1954), professional bowler

Thomas Baker (college president) (1871–1939), president of Carnegie Mellon University

Tom Baker (1930s pitcher) (1913–1991), Major League Baseball player, pitcher for the Brooklyn Dodgers and New York Giants

Tom Baker (1960s pitcher) (1934–1980), Major League Baseball player, pitcher for the Chicago Cubs

Tom Baker (politician), (born 1948), state senator in the Nebraska Legislature

Tom Baker (professor), law professor at the University of Pennsylvania Law School

Thomas Baker (soldier) (1916–1944), World War II Medal of Honor recipient

Thomas E. Baker, professor of Constitutional law and former administrative assistant to William Rehnquist

Tom Baker, Lutheran pastor and radio host on KFUO-AM

Fictional characters

Tom Baker (''24'' character)

DC Tom Baker, a character on ''The Bill''

Tom Baker, a character in the 2003 film of ''Cheaper by the Dozen''

Songs

"Tom Baker", a song by Human League on some versions of ''Travelogue''

Richard Dadd (1 August 1817 – 7 January 1886) was an English painter of the Victorian era, noted for his depictions of fairies and other supernatural subjects, Orientalist scenes, and enigmatic genre scenes, rendered with obsessively minuscule detail. Most of the works for which he is best known were created while he was incarcerated in a psychiatric hospital.

Life and work

Dadd was born at Chatham, Kent, England, the son of a chemist. His aptitude for drawing was evident at an early age, leading to his admission to the Royal Academy of Arts at the age of 20. With William Powell Frith, Augustus Egg, Henry O'Neil and others, he founded The Clique, of which he was generally considered the leading talent.

In July 1842, Sir Thomas Phillips, the former mayor of Newport, chose Dadd to accompany him as his draftsman on an expedition through Europe to Greece, Turkey, Southern Syria and finally Egypt. In November of that year they spent a gruelling two weeks in Southern Syria, passing from Jerusalem to Jordan and returning across the Engaddi wilderness. Toward the end of December, while travelling up the Nile by boat, Dadd underwent a dramatic personality change, becoming delusional and increasingly violent, and believing himself to be under the influence of the Egyptian god Osiris. His condition was initially thought to be sunstroke.

On his return in the spring of 1843, he was diagnosed to be of unsound mind and was taken by his family to recuperate in the countryside village of Cobham, Kent. In August of that year, having become convinced that his father was the Devil in disguise, Dadd killed him with a knife and fled for France. En route to Paris Dadd attempted to kill another tourist with a razor, but was overpowered and was arrested by the police. Dadd confessed to the killing of his father and was returned to England, where he was committed to the criminal department of Bethlem psychiatric hospital (also known as Bedlam). Here and subsequently at the newly created Broadmoor Hospital, Dadd was cared for (and encouraged to continue painting) by the likes of Drs William Wood and Sir W. Charles Hood, in an enlightened manner.

Dadd probably suffered from a form of paranoid schizophrenia. He appears to have been genetically predisposed to mental illness; two of his siblings were similarly afflicted, while a third had "a private attendant" for unknown reasons.

In the hospital he was allowed to continue to paint and it was here that many of his masterpieces were created, including his most celebrated painting, ''The Fairy Feller's Master-Stroke'', which he worked on between 1855 and 1864. Also dating from the 1850s are the thirty-three watercolour drawings titled ''Sketches to Illustrate the Passions'', which include ''Grief or Sorrow'', ''Love'', and ''Jealousy'', as well as ''Agony-Raving Madness'' and ''Murder''. Like most of his works these are executed on a small scale and feature protagonists whose eyes are fixed in a peculiar, unfocused stare. Dadd also produced many shipping scenes and landscapes during his incarceration, such as the ethereal 1861 watercolour ''Port Stragglin''. These are executed with a miniaturist's eye for detail which belie the fact that they are products of imagination and memory.

After 20 years at Bethlem, Dadd was moved to the criminal lunatic asylum at Broadmoor, outside London. Here he remained, painting constantly and receiving infrequent visitors until 7 January 1886, when he died, "from an extensive disease of the lungs."

Legacy

''The Fairy Feller's Master-Stroke'' inspired a song of the same name by the British rock band Queen. The painting also is a plot element in ''The Witches of Chiswick'' by Robert Rankin. ''The Wee Free Men'', a novel by Terry Pratchett, edited in 2003, was in a central part inspired by it as well.

The British fantasy writer Angela Carter wrote ''Come unto these Yellow Sands'', a radio-play based on Dadd's life.

The British composer Oliver Knussen considered naming his piece ''Flourish with Fireworks'' after ''The Fairy Feller's Master-Stroke'', as its composition owes a lot to the small, exquisite, quirky details in the painting and contains a similar attempted correlation of large and small scale.

Canadian author R.J. Anderson acknowledges Dadd as the basis of her fictional painter Alfred Wrenfield, who figures prominently in her young adult fantasy novel ''Knife'' (''Faery Rebels: Spell Hunter'' in the USA). The full name of the eccentric character Mr. Dick in ''David Copperfield'' by Charles Dickens is Richard Babley, which echoes the name of Dickens' contemporary Richard Dadd.

In 1987 a long-lost watercolour by Dadd, ''The Artist's Halt in the Desert'', was discovered by Peter Nahum on the BBC TV programme ''Antiques Roadshow''. Made while the artist was incarcerated, it is based on sketches made during his tour of the Middle East, and shows his party encamped by the Dead Sea, with Dadd at the far right. It was later sold for £100,000 to the British Museum.

Notes

See also

Fairy painting

References

Allderidge, Patricia (1974). ''Richard Dadd''. New York and London: St. Martin's Press/Academy Editions.

Allderidge, Patricia (1974). ''The Late Richard Dadd 1817-1886''. London: The Tate Gallery.

Chaney, Edward (2006). 'Egypt in England and America: The Cultural Memorials of Religion, Royalty and Religion', ''Sites of Exchange: European Crossroads and Faultlines'', eds. M. Ascari and A. Corrado. Amsterdam and New York: Rodopi.

Chaney, Edward (2006b). 'Freudian Egypt', ''The London Magazine'' (April/May 2006), pp. 62-69.

Greysmith, David (1973). ''Richard Dadd: The Rock and Castle of Seclusion''. New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc.

Tromans, Nicholas (2011). ''Richard Dadd: the Artist and the Asylum''. London: The Tate Gallery.

External links

Tate online: ''Richard Dadd'' (by Patricia H. Allderidge)

Dadd's portrait of Alexander Morison

Biography of Richard Dadd

Biography of Richard Dadd

Category:1817 births Category:1886 deaths Category:1843 crimes Category:English painters Category:Outsider artists Category:Fantasy artists Category:Fantastic art Category:Deaths from lung disease Category:English murderers

da:Richard Dadd de:Richard Dadd es:Richard Dadd eo:Richard Dadd fr:Richard Dadd it:Richard Dadd nl:Richard Dadd ja:リチャード・ダッド no:Richard Dadd nn:Richard Dadd pl:Richard Dadd pt:Richard Dadd ru:Дадд, Ричард fi:Richard Dadd

name	Freddie Mercury
background	solo_singer
birth name	Farrokh Bulsara
birth date	September 05, 1946
birth place	Stone Town, Zanzibar
origin	London, England, UK
nationality	British Indian
death date	November 24, 1991
death place	Kensington, London, England, United Kingdom
genre	Rock, hard rock, glam rock
instrument	Vocals, piano, keyboards, guitar
occupation	Musician, singer-songwriter, record producer
years active	1969–1991
label	Columbia, Polydor, EMI, Parlophone, Hollywood Records
associated acts	Queen, Wreckage/Ibex, Montserrat Caballé }}

Freddie Mercury (born Farrokh Bulsara (Gujarati: ફારોખ બલ્સારા‌), 5 September 1946 – 24 November 1991) was a British musician, singer and songwriter, best known as the lead vocalist of the rock band Queen. As a performer, he was known for his flamboyant stage persona and powerful vocals over a four-octave range. As a songwriter, Mercury composed many hits for Queen, including "Bohemian Rhapsody", "Killer Queen", "Somebody to Love", "Don't Stop Me Now", "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" and "We Are the Champions". In addition to his work with Queen, he led a solo career, penning hits such as "Barcelona", "I Was Born to Love You" and "Living on My Own". Mercury also occasionally served as a producer and guest musician (piano or vocals) for other artists. He died of bronchopneumonia brought on by AIDS on 24 November 1991, only one day after publicly acknowledging he had the disease.

Mercury, who was a Parsi born in Zanzibar and grew up there and in India until his mid-teens, has been referred to as "Britain's first Asian rock star". In 2006, ''Time Asia'' named him as one of the most influential Asian heroes of the past 60 years, and he continues to be voted one of the greatest singers in the history of popular music. In 2005, a poll organised by ''Blender'' and MTV2 saw Mercury voted the greatest male singer of all time. In 2008, ''Rolling Stone'' editors ranked him number 18 on their list of the 100 greatest singers of all time. In 2009, a ''Classic Rock'' poll saw him voted the greatest rock singer of all time. Allmusic has characterised Mercury as "one of rock's greatest all-time entertainers", who possessed "one of the greatest voices in all of music".

Early life

Mercury was born in the British protectorate of Zanzibar, East Africa (now part of Tanzania). His parents, Bomi and Jer Bulsara, were Parsis from the Gujarat region of the then province of Bombay Presidency in British India. The family surname is derived from the town of Bulsar (also known as Valsad) in southern Gujarat. As Parsis, Mercury and his family practised the Zoroastrian religion. The Bulsara family had moved to Zanzibar so that his father could continue his job as a cashier at the British Colonial Office. He had a younger sister, Kashmira.

Mercury spent the bulk of his childhood in India and began taking piano lessons at the age of seven. In 1954, at the age of eight, Mercury was sent to study at St. Peter's School, a British-style boarding school for boys in Panchgani near Bombay (now Mumbai), India. Aged 12, he formed a school band, The Hectics, and covered artists such as Cliff Richard and Little Richard. A friend from the time recalls that he had "an uncanny ability to listen to the radio and replay what he heard on piano". It was also at St. Peter's where he began to call himself "Freddie". Mercury remained in India, living with his grandmother and aunt until he completed his education at St. Mary's School, Bombay.

At the age of 17, Mercury and his family fled from Zanzibar for safety reasons due to the 1964 Zanzibar Revolution. The family moved into a small house in Feltham, Middlesex, England. Mercury enrolled at Isleworth Polytechnic (now West Thames College) in West London where he studied art. He ultimately earned a Diploma in Art and Graphic Design at Ealing Art College, later using these skills to design the Queen crest. Mercury remained a British citizen for the rest of his life.

Following graduation, Mercury joined a series of bands and sold second-hand clothes in the Kensington Market in London. He also held a job at Heathrow Airport. Friends from the time remember him as a quiet and shy young man who showed a great deal of interest in music. In 1969 he joined the band Ibex, later renamed Wreckage. When this band failed to take off, he joined a second band called Sour Milk Sea. However, by early 1970 this group broke up as well.

In April 1970, Mercury joined guitarist Brian May and drummer Roger Taylor who had previously been in a band called Smile. Despite reservations from the other members, Mercury chose the name "Queen" for the new band. He later said about the band's name, "I was certainly aware of the gay connotations, but that was just one facet of it". At about the same time, he changed his surname, Bulsara, to Mercury.

Career

Singer

Although Mercury's speaking voice naturally fell in the baritone range, he delivered most songs in the tenor range. His vocal range extended from bass low F (F2) to soprano high F (F6). He could belt up to tenor high F (F5). Biographer David Bret described his voice as "escalating within a few bars from a deep, throaty rock-growl to tender, vibrant tenor, then on to a high-pitched, perfect coloratura, pure and crystalline in the upper reaches". Spanish soprano Montserrat Caballé, with whom Mercury recorded an album, expressed her opinion that "the difference between Freddie and almost all the other rock stars was that he was selling the voice". She adds, "His technique was astonishing. No problem of tempo, he sung with an incisive sense of rhythm, his vocal placement was very good and he was able to glide effortlessly from a register to another. He also had a great musicality. His phrasing was subtle, delicate and sweet or energetic and slamming. He was able to find the right colouring or expressive nuance for each word." As Queen's career progressed, he would increasingly alter the highest notes of their songs when live, often harmonising with seconds, thirds or fifths instead. Mercury was said to have "the rawest vocal fold nodules" and claimed never to have had any formal vocal training.

Songwriter

Mercury wrote 10 of the 17 songs on Queen's ''Greatest Hits'' album: "Bohemian Rhapsody", "Seven Seas of Rhye", "Killer Queen", "Somebody to Love", "Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy", "We Are the Champions", "Bicycle Race", "Don't Stop Me Now", "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" and "Play the Game".

The most notable aspect of his songwriting involved the wide range of genres that he used, which included, among other styles, rockabilly, progressive rock, heavy metal, gospel and disco. As he explained in a 1986 interview, "I hate doing the same thing again and again and again. I like to see what's happening now in music, film and theatre and incorporate all of those things." Compared to many popular songwriters, Mercury also tended to write musically complex material. For example, "Bohemian Rhapsody" is acyclic in structure and comprises dozens of chords. He also wrote six songs from Queen II which deal with multiple key changes and complex material. "Crazy Little Thing Called Love", on the other hand, contains only a few chords. Despite the fact that Mercury often wrote very intricate harmonies, he also claimed that he could barely read music. He wrote most of his songs on the piano and used a wide variety of different key signatures.

Live performer

Mercury was noted for his live performances, which were often delivered to stadium audiences around the world. He displayed a highly theatrical style that often evoked a great deal of participation from the crowd. A writer for ''The Spectator'' described him as "a performer out to tease, shock and ultimately charm his audience with various extravagant versions of himself". David Bowie, who performed at the Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert and recorded the song "Under Pressure" with Queen, praised Mercury's performance style, saying: "Of all the more theatrical rock performers, Freddie took it further than the rest... he took it over the edge. And of course, I always admired a man who wears tights. I only saw him in concert once and as they say, he was definitely a man who could hold an audience in the palm of his hand."

One of Mercury's most notable performances with Queen took place at Live Aid in 1985, during which the entire stadium audience of 72,000 people clapped, sang and swayed in unison. Queen's performance at the event has since been voted by a group of music executives as the greatest live performance in the history of rock music. The results were aired on a television program called "The World's Greatest Gigs". In reviewing Live Aid in 2005, one critic wrote, "Those who compile lists of Great Rock Frontmen and award the top spots to Mick Jagger, Robert Plant, etc all are guilty of a terrible oversight. Freddie, as evidenced by his Dionysian Live Aid performance, was easily the most godlike of them all."

Over the course of his career, Mercury performed an estimated 700 concerts in countries around the world with Queen. A notable aspect of Queen concerts was the large scale involved. He once explained, "We're the Cecil B. DeMille of rock and roll, always wanting to do things bigger and better." The band were the first ever to play in South American stadiums, breaking worldwide records for concert attendance in the Morumbi Stadium in São Paulo in 1981. In 1986, Queen also played behind the Iron Curtain when they performed to a crowd of 80,000 in Budapest, in what was one of the biggest rock concerts ever held in Eastern Europe. Mercury's final live performance with Queen took place on 9 August 1986 at Knebworth Park in England and drew an attendance estimated as high as 300,000.

Instrumentalist

As a young boy in India, Mercury received formal piano training up to the age of nine. Later on, while living in London, he learned guitar. Much of the music he liked was guitar-oriented: his favourite artists at the time were The Who, The Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, David Bowie, and Led Zeppelin. He was often self-deprecating about his own skills on both instruments and from the early 1980s onward began extensively using guest keyboardists for both Queen and his solo career. Most notably, he enlisted Fred Mandel (a Canadian musician who also worked for Pink Floyd, Elton John and Supertramp) for his first solo project, and from 1985 onward collaborated with Mike Moran (in the studio) and Spike Edney (in concert), leaving most of the keyboard work exclusively to them.

Mercury played the piano in many of Queen's most popular songs, including "Killer Queen", "Bohemian Rhapsody", "Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy", "We Are the Champions", "Somebody To Love" and "Don't Stop Me Now". He used concert grand pianos and, occasionally, other keyboard instruments such as the harpsichord. From 1980 onward, he also made frequent use of synthesisers in the studio. Queen guitarist Brian May claims that Mercury was unimpressed with his own abilities at the piano and used the instrument less over time because he wanted to walk around onstage and entertain the audience. Although he wrote many lines for the guitar, Mercury possessed only rudimentary skills on the instrument. Songs like "Ogre Battle" and "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" were composed on the guitar; the latter featured Mercury playing acoustic guitar both on stage and in the studio.

Solo career

In addition to his work with Queen, Mercury put out two solo albums and several singles. Although his solo work was not as commercially successful as most Queen albums, the two off-Queen albums and several of the singles debuted in the top 10 of the UK Album Charts. His first solo effort involved his contribution to the Richard "Wolfie" Wolf mix of ''Love Kills'' on the 1984 album (the song also used as the end title theme for National Lampoon's "Loaded Weapon") and new soundtrack to the 1926 Fritz Lang film ''Metropolis''. The song, produced by Giorgio Moroder, debuted at the number 10 position in the UK charts.

Mercury's two full albums outside the band were ''Mr. Bad Guy'' (1985) and ''Barcelona'' (1988). The former is a pop-oriented album that emphasises disco and dance music. "Barcelona" was recorded and performed with the opera singer Montserrat Caballé, whom he had long admired. ''Mr. Bad Guy'' debuted in the top ten of the UK Album Charts. In 1993, a remix of "Living on My Own", a single from the album, reached the No.1 position on the UK Singles Charts. The song also garnered Mercury a posthumous Ivor Novello Award. Allmusic critic Eduardo Rivadavia describes ''Mr. Bad Guy'' as "outstanding from start to finish" and expressed his view that Mercury "did a commendable job of stretching into uncharted territory". In particular, the album is heavily synthesiser-driven in a way that is not characteristic of previous Queen albums.

''Barcelona'', recorded with Spanish soprano Montserrat Caballé, combines elements of popular music and opera. Many critics were uncertain what to make of the album; one referred to it as "the most bizarre CD of the year". The album was a commercial success, and the album's title track debuted at the No.8 position in the UK charts and was a hit in Spain. The title track received massive air play as the official hymn of the 1992 Summer Olympics (held in Barcelona one year after Mercury's death). Caballé sang it live at the opening of the Olympics with Mercury's part played on a screen, and again prior to the start of the 1999 UEFA Champions League Final in Barcelona.

In addition to the two solo albums, Mercury released several singles, including his own version of the hit The Great Pretender by The Platters, which debuted at number five in the UK in 1987. In September 2006, a compilation album featuring Mercury's solo work was released in the UK in honour of what would have been his 60th birthday. The album debuted in the top 10 of the UK Album Charts.

In 1981–1983, Mercury recorded several tracks with Michael Jackson, including a demo of "State of Shock", "Victory" and "There Must Be More to Life Than This". None of these collaborations were officially released, although bootleg recordings exist. Jackson went on to record the single "State of Shock" with Mick Jagger for The Jacksons's album ''Victory''. Mercury included the solo version of "There Must Be More To Life Than This" on his ''Mr. Bad Guy'' album.

Personal life

Relationships

In the early 1970s Mercury had a long-term relationship with Mary Austin, whom he had met through guitarist Brian May. He lived with Austin for several years in West Kensington. By the mid-1970s, however, the singer had begun an affair with a male American record executive at Elektra Records, which ultimately resulted in the end of his relationship with Austin. Mercury and Austin nevertheless remained close friends through the years, with Mercury often referring to her as his only true friend. In a 1985 interview, Mercury said of Austin, "All my lovers asked me why they couldn't replace Mary [Austin], but it's simply impossible. The only friend I've got is Mary and I don't want anybody else. To me, she was my common-law wife. To me, it was a marriage. We believe in each other, that's enough for me." He also wrote several songs about Austin, the most notable of which is "Love of My Life". Mercury was also the godfather of Mary's oldest son, Richard.

During the early-to-mid-80s, he was romantically involved with Barbara Valentin, an Austrian actress, who is featured in the video for "It's a Hard Life". By 1985, he began another long-term relationship with a hairdresser named Jim Hutton. Hutton, who himself was tested HIV-positive in 1990, lived with Mercury for the last six years of his life, nursed him during his illness and was present at his bedside when he died. Hutton claimed that Mercury died wearing a wedding band that Hutton had given him. Hutton died from cancer on 1 January 2010.

Personality

Although he cultivated a flamboyant stage personality, Mercury was a very shy and retiring man in person, particularly around people he did not know well. He also granted very few interviews. Mercury once said of himself: "When I'm performing I'm an extrovert, yet inside I'm a completely different man." While on stage, Mercury basked in the love from the audience, which was famously noted by Kurt Cobain, in his suicide note, when he wrote of how he both admired and envied Mercury for being able to do so.

Criticism and controversy

Sexual orientation

Mercury was an acknowledged bisexual. While some critics claimed he hid his sexual orientation from the public, others claimed he was "openly gay".

He would often distance himself from his partner, Jim Hutton, during public events in the 1980s. When asked directly "So how about being bent? " by the ''New Musical Express'' in December 1974, Mercury replied "You're a crafty cow. Let's put it this way, there were times when I was young and green. It's a thing schoolboys go through. I've had my share of schoolboy pranks. I'm not going to elaborate further." A writer for a gay online newspaper felt that audiences may have been overly naïve about the matter: "While in many respects he was overtly queer his whole career ("I am as gay as a daffodil, my dear" being one of his most famous quotes), his sexual orientation seemed to pass over the heads of scrutinising audiences and pundits (both gay and straight) for decades". John Marshall of ''Gay Times'' expressed the following opinion in 1992: "[Mercury] was a 'scene-queen', not afraid to publicly express his gayness but unwilling to analyse or justify his 'lifestyle' ... It was as if Freddie Mercury was saying to the world, "I am what I am. So what?" And that in itself for some was a statement."

HIV

Mercury hid his HIV status from the public for several years, and it has been suggested that he could have raised a great deal of money and awareness earlier by speaking truthfully about his situation and his fight against the disease.

Other controversies

Queen were widely criticised when they broke a United Nations cultural boycott in 1984 by performing a series of shows at Sun City, an entertainment complex in Bophuthatswana, a homeland of (then) apartheid South Africa. As a result of these shows, Queen was placed on a United Nations list of artists who broke the boycott and was widely criticised in magazines such as the ''NME''.

A further controversy ensued in August 2006, when an organisation calling itself the Islamic Mobilization and Propagation petitioned the Zanzibar government's culture ministry, demanding that a large-scale celebration of what would have been Mercury's sixtieth birthday be cancelled. The organisation issued several complaints about the planned celebrations, including that Mercury was not a true Zanzibari and that he was gay, which is not in accordance with their interpretation of sharia. The organisation claimed that "associating Mercury with Zanzibar degrades our island as a place of Islam". The planned celebration was cancelled.

== Illness and death == According to his partner Jim Hutton, Mercury was diagnosed with AIDS shortly after Easter of 1987. Around that time, Mercury claimed in an interview to have tested negative for HIV. Despite the denials, the British press pursued the rampant rumours over the next few years, fuelled by Mercury's increasingly gaunt appearance, Queen's absence from touring, and reports from former lovers to various tabloid journals - by 1990 the rumours about Mercury's health were rife. Toward the end of his life, he was routinely stalked by photographers, while the daily tabloid newspaper ''The Sun'' featured a series of articles claiming that he was seriously ill.

However, Mercury and his inner circle of colleagues and friends, whom he felt he could trust, continually denied the stories, even after one front page article published on 29 April 1991, which showed Mercury appearing very haggard in what was now a rare public appearance. Brian May confirmed in a 1993 interview that Mercury had informed the band of his illness much earlier. Filmed in May 1991, the music video for "These Are the Days of Our Lives" feature a painfully thin Mercury, which are his final scenes in front of the camera.

After the conclusion of his work with Queen in June 1991, Mercury retired to his home in Kensington. His former partner, Mary Austin, had been a particular comfort in his final years, and in the last few weeks of his life made regular visits to his home to look after him. Near the end of his life, Mercury was starting to lose his sight, and his deterioration was so overpowering he couldn't get out of bed. Due to his worsening condition, Mercury decided to quicken his death by refusing to take his medication.

On 22 November 1991, Mercury called Queen's manager Jim Beach over to his Kensington home, to discuss a public statement. The next day, 23 November, the following announcement was made to the press on behalf of Mercury:

Following the enormous conjecture in the press over the last two weeks, I wish to confirm that I have been tested HIV positive and have AIDS. I felt it correct to keep this information private to date to protect the privacy of those around me. However, the time has come now for my friends and fans around the world to know the truth and I hope that everyone will join with me, my doctors, and all those worldwide in the fight against this terrible disease. My privacy has always been very special to me and I am famous for my lack of interviews. Please understand this policy will continue.

A little over 24 hours after issuing that statement, Mercury died on the evening of 24 November 1991 at the age of 45, at his home in Kensington. The official cause of death was bronchial pneumonia resulting from AIDS. The news of his death had reached newspaper and television crews by the early hours of 25 November.

On 27 November, Mercury's funeral service was conducted by a Zoroastrian priest. An intensely private man, Mercury's service was for 35 of his close friends and family, with Elton John and the remaining members of Queen among those in attendance. Mercury was cremated at Kensal Green Cemetery, West London, with the whereabouts of his ashes believed to be known only to Mary Austin.

In his will, Mercury left the vast majority of his wealth, including his home and recording royalties, to Mary Austin, and the remainder to his parents and sister. He further 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 Jim Hutton. Mary Austin continues to live at Mercury's home, Garden Lodge, Kensington, with her family. Hutton was involved in a 2000 biography of Mercury, ''Freddie Mercury, the Untold Story'', and also gave an interview for ''The Times'' for what would have been Mercury's 60th birthday.

Legacy

Continued popularity

The extent to which Mercury's death may have enhanced Queen's popularity is not clear. In the United States, where Queen's popularity had lagged in the 1980s, sales of Queen albums went up dramatically in 1992, the year following his death. In 1992 one American critic noted, "what cynics call the 'dead star' factor had come into play—Queen is in the middle of a major resurgence". The movie ''Wayne's World'', which featured "Bohemian Rhapsody", also came out in 1992. According to the Recording Industry Association of America, Queen have sold 32.5 million albums in the United States, about half of which have been sold since Mercury's death in 1991.

Estimates of Queen's total worldwide record sales to date have been set as high as 300 million. In the UK, Queen have now spent more collective weeks on the UK Album Charts than any other musical act (including The Beatles), and ''Queen's Greatest Hits'' is the highest selling album of all time in the UK. Two of Mercury's songs, "We Are the Champions" and "Bohemian Rhapsody", have also each been voted as the greatest song of all time in major polls by Sony Ericsson and Guinness World Records, respectively. The former poll was an attempt to determine the world's favourite song, while the Guinness poll took place in the UK. In October 2007, the video for "Bohemian Rhapsody" was voted the greatest of all time by readers of ''Q'' magazine. Consistently rated as one of the greatest singers in the history of popular music, Mercury was voted second to Mariah Carey in MTV's 22 Greatest Voices in Music. Additionally, in January 2009, Mercury was voted second to Robert Plant in a poll of the greatest voices in rock, on the digital radio station Planet Rock. In May 2009, Classic Rock magazine voted Freddie Mercury as the greatest singer in rock. In 2011, NME magazine readers voted Mercury second to Michael Jackson in the Greatest Singers Ever poll. In 2011, a ''Rolling Stone'' readers' pick placed Mercury in second place of the magazine's "Best Lead Singers of All Time".

Tributes

A statue in Montreux, Switzerland (by sculptor Irena Sedlecka) has been erected as a tribute to Mercury. It stands 3 metres high overlooking Lake Geneva and was unveiled on 25 November 1996 by Freddie's father and Montserrat Caballé. Beginning in 2003, fans from around the world gather in Switzerland annually to pay tribute to the singer as part of the "Freddie Mercury Montreux Memorial Day" on the first weekend of September and the Bearpark And Esh Colliery Band played at the Freddie Mercury statue on 1 June 2010. In 1999, a Royal Mail stamp with the image of Mercury on stage was issued in his honour as part of the Millennium Stamp series.

In 2009, a plaque was unveiled in Feltham where Mercury and his family moved upon arriving in England in 1964. The star in memory of Mercury's achievements was unveiled in Feltham High Street by his mother Jer Bulsara and Queen bandmate Brian May. A tribute to Queen has been on display at the Fremont Street Experience in downtown Las Vegas throughout 2009 on its video canopy. In December 2009 a large model of Mercury wearing tartan was put on display in the centre of Edinburgh as publicity for the run of ''We Will Rock You'' at the Playhouse Theatre.

A statue of Mercury stands over the entrance to the Dominion Theatre in London's West End since May 2002, where the main show has been Queen and Ben Elton's musical ''We Will Rock You''.

Importance in AIDS history

As the first major rock star to die of AIDS, Mercury's death represented a very important event in the disease's history. In April 1992, the remaining members of Queen founded The Mercury Phoenix Trust and organised ''The Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert for AIDS Awareness'' to celebrate the life and legacy of Mercury and raise money for AIDS research, which took place on Easter Monday, 20 April 1992. The Mercury Phoenix Trust has since raised millions of pounds for various AIDS charities. The tribute concert, which took place at Wembley Stadium for an audience of 72,000, featured a wide variety of guests including; Robert Plant (of Led Zeppelin), Roger Daltrey (of The Who), Extreme, Elton John, Metallica, David Bowie, Annie Lennox, Tony Iommi (of Black Sabbath), Guns N' Roses, Elizabeth Taylor, George Michael, Def Leppard, Seal, Liza Minnelli (and also U2 via Satellite). Elizabeth Taylor spoke of Mercury as "an extraordinary rock star who rushed across our cultural landscape like a comet shooting across the sky". The concert was broadcast live to 76 countries and had an estimated viewing audience of 1 billion people.

Appearances in lists of influential individuals

Several popularity polls conducted over the past decade indicate that Freddie Mercury's reputation may in fact have been enhanced since his death. For instance, in a 2002 vote to determine whom the UK public considers the greatest British people in history, Mercury was ranked number 58 in the list of the "''100 Greatest Britons''", broadcast by the BBC. He was further listed at the 52nd spot in a 2007 Japanese national survey of the 100 most "influential heroes". Despite the fact that he had been criticised by gay activists for hiding his HIV status, author Paul Russell included Mercury in his book "The Gay 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Gay Men and Lesbians, Past and Present." Other entertainers on Russell's list included Liberace and Rock Hudson. In 2006, ''Time Asia'' magazine named him as one of the most influential Asian heroes of the past 60 years: The article credited Mercury with having "duplicated in popular music what other Indians—such as Salman Rushdie and Vikram Seth – have done in literature: taking the coloniser's art form and representing it in a manner richer and more dazzling than many Anglophones thought possible." In 2008, ''Rolling Stone''' magazine ranked Mercury No.18 in its list of the "Top 100 Singers Of All Time".

Portrayal on stage

On 24 November 1997, a monodrama about Freddie Mercury's life titled Mercury: The Afterlife and Times of a Rock God opened in New York City. It presented Freddie Mercury in the hereafter; examining his life, seeking redemption and searching for his true self The play was written and directed by Charles Messina and the part of Mercury was played by Khalid Gonçalves (né Paul Gonçalves) and then later, Amir Darvish. Billy Squier opened one of the shows with an acoustic performance of a song he had written about Mercury titled ''I Have Watched You Fly''.

Portrayal in film

Brian May announced in a September 2010 BBC interview that Sacha Baron Cohen, previously best known for his comedic characters Borat, Ali G and Brüno, had been chosen to play Mercury in a film about his life. ''TIME'' commented with approval on his singing ability and visual similarity to Mercury. The motion picture is being written by Peter Morgan, who had been nominated for Oscars for his screenplays ''The Queen'' and ''Frost/Nixon''. The film, which is being co-produced by Robert De Niro's TriBeCa Productions, will focus on Queen's formative years and the period leading up to the celebrated performance at the 1985 Live Aid concert. Filming is due to begin sometime in 2011.

In April 2011, Brian May confirmed that a lot of work was still being done in preparation for the film. He said that after holding back for a long time due to mixed feelings, the band had approved a team to start filming later in 2011, and Baron Cohen's eagerness had been the key to progress.

Discography

Notes

his parents defined themselves with "Nationality: British Indian" and "Race: Parsi". The Parsis are an originally Persian ethnic group of the Indian subcontinent who follow Zoroastrianism. |- | style="vertical-align:top; width:3em; text-align:right;"|b) | The Bulsara family gets its name from Bulsar, a city and district that is now in the Indian state of Gujarat and is today officially known as Valsad. In the 17th century, Bulsar was one of the five centres of the Zoroastrian religion (the other four were also in what is today Gujarat) and consequently "Bulsara" is a relatively common name amongst Zoroastrians. |- | style="vertical-align:top; width:3em; text-align:right;"|c) | Mercury is portrayed in the manga and anime series Cromartie High School as the character Freddie (and as the minor character Mercury), and as himself in the British Channel 4 show House of Rock along with Marc Bolan, John Lennon, Notorious BIG, John Denver and Kurt Cobain. |}

References

Notation done in Scientific Pitch, and thus is written one octave lower than what is displayed here.

Bibliography

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External links

(official EMI Music)

Category:1946 births Category:1991 deaths Category:AIDS-related deaths in England Category:Bisexual musicians Category:BRIT Award winners Category:British people of Parsi descent Category:English male singers Category:English people of Indian descent Category:English pianists Category:English rock keyboardists Category:English rock musicians Category:English rock singers Category:English singer-songwriters Category:English songwriters Category:English tenors Category:English Zoroastrians Category:Tanzanian emigrants to the United Kingdom Category:Ivor Novello Award winners Category:LGBT musicians from the United Kingdom Category:LGBT people from Africa Category:LGBT people from South Asia Category:Queen (band) members Category:Zanzibari Indians

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