Episode 162 Celebrating Freddie Mercury's Life And Songs

Today is Queen rock star Freddie Mercury's birthday. In celebration we have a listening episode all about him, his bandmates and his songs. Did you recognise the lyrics from the beginning of the episode? Which songs did you think they were from? Answers at the bottom of the page. You can head to the YouTube channel to find my Queen Playlist, and dance your heart out. During this episode I mentioned conversations a journalist had with Freddie and his partner about Bohemian Rhapsody. If you're interested in hearing more you can check out that article here:https://thewire.in/culture/is-bohemian-rhapsody-really-all-about-freddie-mercury As I mentioned in the episode Freddie's bandmates created the Mercury Phoenix Trust to raise money for AIDS research and charities. The trust continues today and Brian May and Roger Taylor continue to hold concerts to raise money for the trust. You can learn all about the trust here: https://www.mercuryphoenixtrust.org/ The songs I mentioned at the beginning of the episode were: 1. Bohemian Rhapsody 2. Crazy Little Thing Called Love 3. Don't Stop Me Now 4. Friends Will Be Friends 5. Under Pressure 6. Bicycle Ride All written by Freddie. Vocabulary lyrics - the words written to accompany music and make songs iconic/icon - an icon is someone who is very famous and considered worthy of worship. Iconic means something that is extremely memorable and held in high esteem. playing by ear - to listen to some music and be able to easily work out how to play it without reading the music. amplifiers - the machinery used on stage to make music louder astrophysicist - someone who studies the physics of the universe she put to him some of her guesses - 'put to' someone is a phrasal verb meaning to make a suggestion Scaramouche - a famous clown from old Italian theatre Galileo - a famous mathematician, one of the first to suggest that the world went round the sun, rather than the religiously accepted idea that the sun went round the earth. Beelzebub - the devil Figaro - a famous opera, but also a cat in Disney's Pinocchio Pinocchio - a fairytale about a wooden puppet who comes to life.