“I’m a huge Queen fan and the man that led it for me-with myself being a singer-was Freddie Mercury. He had this incredibly versatile, extraordinary voice that could be very sweet and demure and laidback with certain songs, and then he could just rip your head off with a song like “Ogre Battle.”

He’s always been an inspiration to me. You know, I’ve got a list of singers who really touch me in the purest sense, from the vocal performance as well as just the soul and spirit. So he does that, he just belts it out with such conviction and honesty. There are very few singers capable of covering that amount of territory and being convincing. When he performed he put his heart and soul into it, and you believed what he was singing.

Coupled with his voice was his tremendous stage persona-one of the most tremendous frontmen to walk on stage with a mic. Everybody in Queen was spectacular to watch in concert, but Freddie was “the man” from the moment he walked out and started to perform. Your eyes never left him because he was such a charismatic performer. And you could always sense in the music that he had a lot of fun… just sitting down at the piano. There was a sense of who knew where things would take him on any given day of writing? Anything was possible.

When I’m in the studio, I’ve always thought — when I do a track, even with Priest I’ll think, ‘Well what would Freddie possibly do here,’ you know.”

Robert “Rob” Halford, Lead Singer for Judas Priest

Rob is known for his powerful, wide-ranging operatic voice and strong vibrato

Freddie, inspiring to a countless number of performers. The genres don’t matter. Music is limitless and he’s inspired everyone from country, opera, pop, rock and heavy metal. A true legend who has touched many artists with his brilliant gift of music not to mention his billions of fans around the world!