Freddie Mercury, 25 years after the candle went out

Remembering The Great Showman of Rock music.

Have 25 years passed since Freddie Mercury left us?

Why, it seems like yesterday.

Freddie was just 45 when AIDS snuffed out his incandescent existence on November 24, 1991.

He would have been 70 this September had he lived, and the mind rattles with the possibilities of the great showman of rock music as an old man.

Freddie was Parsi, he was born Farrokh Bulsara, grew up in India and moved to England as a teenager.

After forming the band Queen in 1970, he startled the world with his music, and all those wonderful songs: I Want To Break Free... Bohemian Rhapsody.. Killer Queen.. Bicycle Race... We Are The Champions.. Don't Stop Me Now... Play The Game...

25 years after the candle went out, Freddie continues to dazzle us with his music and his can't-be-copied showmanship. We turn to it whenever we want to smile.

Saluting Freddie Mercury on this unforgettable day with glimpses of a kind from his all too short life.

Freddie during a performance at the National Bowl in Milton Keynes, England, June 5, 1982.

A candid capture during a ballet class in London's Covent Garden, which Freddie attended, October 3, 1979.

Freddie goofs around in the ballet class as only he can.

Freddie shaving his moustache, April 12, 1984.

His famous moustache posthumously won the title of Britain's Greatest Ever Moustache in a 2009 poll.

Queen were presented with silver, gold and platinum discs for (sales in excess of one million) their awesome hit single Bohemian Rhapsody at the Les Ambassadeurs casino.

Elton John and Freddie were close friends, and the most famously gay men in English music at that time had pet names for each other. Freddie was Melina, Elton Sharon.

Queen in concert.

Grooming the famous moustache!

Freddie's majestic robe displayed at Christie's before an auction in London, April 26, 2007.

Queen's lead guitarist Brian May and Freddie's sister Kashmira Cooke look out of a window in the house where Freddie lived.

Jer Bulsara, his mother and biggest champion, died this month, aged 94. A must read from Mid-Day Old relatives from Mumbai pay tribute to Freddie Mercury's late mother (external link).