"Love of My Life" is a song by the British

rock Rock most often refers to: * Rock (geology), a naturally occurring solid aggregate of minerals or mineraloids * Rock music, a genre of popular music Rock or Rocks may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * Rock, Caerphilly, a location in Wales ...

band

Queen Queen or QUEEN may refer to: Monarchy * Queen regnant, a female monarch of a Kingdom ** List of queens regnant * Queen consort, the wife of a reigning king * Queen dowager, the widow of a king * Queen mother, a queen dowager who is the mother ...

from their 1975 album '' A Night at the Opera''. The song is a

sentimental ballad A sentimental ballad is an emotional style of music that often deals with romantic and intimate relationships, and to a lesser extent, loneliness, death, war, drug abuse, politics and religion, usually in a poignant but solemn manner.J. M. C ...

, notably featuring a

harp The harp is a stringed musical instrument that has a number of individual strings running at an angle to its soundboard; the strings are plucked with the fingers. Harps can be made and played in various ways, standing or sitting, and in orche ...

played by

Brian May Brian Harold May (born 19 July 1947) is an English guitarist, singer, songwriter, and astrophysicist, who achieved worldwide fame as the lead guitarist of the rock band Queen (band), Queen. May was a co-founder of Queen with lead singer Fredd ...

. After Queen performed the song in South America in 1981, the version from their live album ''

Live Killers ''Live Killers'' is a double live album by the British rock band Queen, released on 22 June 1979.Live Ki ...

'' reached number 1 in the singles chart in

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...

and

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

, and stayed in the charts in both countries for an entire year.“Queen: The Ultimate Illustrated History of the Crown Kings of Rock”
p.164. Voyageur Press. Retrieved 12 July 2011 Mercury wrote it on the

piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...

and

guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected stri ...

first, and May rearranged the song for acoustic

12-string guitar A twelve-string guitar (or 12-string guitar) is a steel-string guitar with 12 strings in six courses, which produces a thicker, more ringing tone than a standard six-string guitar. Typically, the strings of the lower four courses are tuned in o ...

for live performances, also lowering the key by a minor third. May contributed occasional guitar phrases to the original recording and played the swooping

glissandos In music, a glissando (; plural: ''glissandi'', abbreviated ''gliss.'') is a wikt:glide, glide from one pitch (music), pitch to another (). It is an Italianized Musical terminology, musical term derived from the French ''glisser'', "to glide". In ...

by pasting together multiple takes of single chords.

Background

Queen spent a month during the summer of 1975 rehearsing in a barn at what would become

Ridge Farm Studio Ridge Farm Studio was one of the earliest residential recording studios in the United Kingdom. The studio operated for over twenty-five years and had artists, musicians, and producers from all over the world record and produce music there. The ...

Surrey Surrey () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South East England, bordering Greater London to the south west. Surrey has a large rural area, and several significant urban areas which form part of the Greater London Built-up Area. ...

. The group then had a three-week writing and rehearsing session in July in a rented house near Kington,

Herefordshire Herefordshire () is a county in the West Midlands of England, governed by Herefordshire Council. It is bordered by Shropshire to the north, Worcestershire to the east, Gloucestershire to the south-east, and the Welsh counties of Monmouthshire ...

before recording began. From August to September 1975 they began to record the song at

Rockfield Studios Rockfield Studios is a residential recording studio located in the Wye Valley just outside the village of Rockfield, Monmouthshire, Wales. It was originally founded in 1963 by brothers Kingsley and Charles Ward. Facilities Rockfield is a two- ...

Monmouthshire Monmouthshire ( cy, Sir Fynwy) is a county in the south-east of Wales. The name derives from the historic county of the same name; the modern county covers the eastern three-fifths of the historic county. The largest town is Abergavenny, with ...

Live performances

Introduced during the

News of the World Tour The News of the World Tour was the fifth headlining concert tour by the British rock band Queen, supporting their successful 1977 album ''News of the World''. The tour spanned from 11 November 1977 to 13 May 1978 over three tour legs: North Ame ...

in 1977, "Love of My Life" was such a concert favourite that Mercury would stop singing and would conduct the audience as they took over. It was especially well received during concerts in South America, and as a result, the band released the ''

Live Killers ''Live Killers'' is a double live album by the British rock band Queen, released on 22 June 1979.Live Ki ...

'' version of the song as a single there.Love of My Life
Allmusic. Retrieved 7 July 2011 A live performance of the song appears in '' Queen at Wembley'' from 1986 where again Mercury conducts the audience as they sing the song. After Mercury's death, Brian May has frequently dedicated the song to him in his own live performances. A notable exception is the Sheffield show which yielded the ''

Return of the Champions ''Return of the Champions'' is a double live album by English rock band Queen + Paul Rodgers. It was recorded in May 2005 during the Queen + Paul Rodgers Tour at the Hallam FM Arena in Sheffield, England (except for "Imagine", which was perform ...

'' CD and DVD. At that show, May announced that Mercury's mother was at the show and he dedicated the song to her instead. In the

Queen + Paul Rodgers Tour Queen + Paul Rodgers Tour (also known as Return of the Champions Tour) was the first world concert tour by Queen guitarist Brian May and drummer Roger Taylor, joined by singer Paul Rodgers under the moniker of Queen + Paul Rodgers. The tour was ...

, May would sing a few lines of the song, then let the audience take over for every verse, as Mercury did. When played at the Glasgow SECC in the 2008 Cosmos Rocks tour, May dedicated the song to his own mother, who had recently died. During

Rock in Rio ''Rock in Rio'' is a recurring music festival originating in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It later branched into other locations such as Lisbon, Madrid and Las Vegas. Nine incarnations of the festival have been held in Rio de Janeiro, in 1985, 1991, ...

6 in 2015,

Queen + Adam Lambert Queen or QUEEN may refer to: Monarchy * Queen regnant, a female monarch of a Kingdom ** List of queens regnant * Queen consort, the wife of a reigning king * Queen dowager, the widow of a king * Queen mother, a queen dowager who is the mothe ...

was one of the artists to celebrate the festival's 30th anniversary. "Love of My Life" had both May singing a few lines and archive footage of Mercury performing the song during the inaugural Wembley concert in 1986.

1979 live single release

The acoustic version of the song featured on the band's 1979 album ''

Live Killers ''Live Killers'' is a double live album by the British rock band Queen, released on 22 June 1979.Live Ki ...

'' was recorded at their concert at Festhalle Frankfurt on 2 February of that year. A shortened version was released as a single in the UK and other territories, which did not include the spoken intros and outros from the album. The liner notes for the DVD release ''

Greatest Video Hits 1 ''Greatest Video Hits 1'' was the first Queen video collection on DVD. Most of the content was released previously on VHS and the long defunct CED Videodisc format as Greatest Flix in 1981. It was released in October 2002, and included video h ...

'' state that although the live audio is from Frankfurt, the accompanying music video that was edited to the track consisted of footage from a 1979 Tokyo concert. In fact, the footage was filmed before one of three Tokyo concerts the band played between 23–25 April. Some bits of footage from two concerts in Paris from earlier in the year are woven in. After performing the song in South America in 1981, it was this version that reached number 1 in the singles chart in Argentina and Brazil, and stayed in the charts in both nations for an entire year.

Personnel

;Original studio version *

Freddie Mercury Freddie Mercury (born Farrokh Bulsara; 5 September 1946 – 24 November 1991) was a British singer and songwriter, who achieved worldwide fame as the lead vocalist of the rock band Queen. Regarded as one of the greatest singers in the ...

– lead and backing vocals, piano *

– acoustic and electric guitar,

Roger Taylor Roger Taylor may refer to: *Roger Taylor (Queen drummer) (born 1949), drummer for Queen *Roger Taylor (Duran Duran drummer) (born 1960), drummer for Duran Duran *Roger Taylor (author), author of epic fantasy Hawklan series *Roger Taylor (college pr ...

– drums, cymbals *

John Deacon John Richard Deacon (born 19 August 1951) is an English retired musician, best known for being the bass guitarist for the rock band Queen. He wrote several songs for the group, including Top 10 hits " You're My Best Friend", "Another One Bite ...

– bass guitar ;1979 live version *

– vocals *

– acoustic guitar

Charts

Year-end charts

Certifications

References

External links

* Official

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videos
original music videoLive at The BowlQueen + Paul Rodgers (Live)

Lyrics at Queen official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Love Of My Life (Queen Song) Queen (band) songs Scorpions (band) songs 1975 songs 1979 singles Songs written by Freddie Mercury 1970s ballads British soft rock songs EMI Records singles Parlophone singles Elektra Records singles Hollywood Records singles