On Friday 29th November and Saturday 30th November 2 parties were organised for Queenfans in England. Not just for fun but also to raise money for the Mercury Phoenix Trust, the Aids-charity Foundation in England. Here's a little report on both parties to keep you all informed....

This little party was organised in a Fire Station!!! Well, the place doesn't matter as long as you have fun and maybe raise some money for the good cause, right? :-)
So, I went to England (I live in The Netherlands myself) to visit my (Queen) friends Joy & Tony Whitelock and together we drove by car from Bridgwater (south-west England) to Birmingham where to party would take place. After 2.5hrs we arrived and after a quick "diner" at a McDonalds we went to search for the Fire Station where 2 bands would do a live-performance. It was a bit tricky to find but finally we did! The Fire Station has a square surrounded by the buildings of the station and inside one of those buildings a small hall on the 3rd floor was used for the party. 2 Bands were announced: support act: The Scooby Blues Band and headlining was the Queen Cover Band from Wales: NIGHT AT THE OPERA.
Because we were early we could hang out with "N.A.T.O" and chat with the band. Then after a while The Scooby Blues Band started to play. The main style was blues/Rock'n Roll but they also played some Queensongs. The 16 year old keyboardplayer was VERY good! Then after the first band an auction and raffle were held to raise money for the Mercury Phoenix Trust. Just before "N.A.T.O" started their show the guitarplayer of the first band came on stage with a copy of Brian May's Red Special! He used a AC30 Vox amplifier just like Brian and he started to play an almost EXACT copy of the "Brighton Rock" solo from the WEMBLEY '86 concert. It was breathtaking and really amazing how well this guy could play! After the solo "N.A.T.O" came on stage and did a full set of Queen songs. Over 1.5 hours they played and (as always) they got the public quite exited. Special songs were the arcoustic version of "Under Pressure" and "Forever" which is a song they wrote themselves to honour Freddie Mercury. At the end of the show the guitarplayer from the first band came on stage to play along with "Tie Your Mother Down". Also people from the organization were called on stage and I came also on dressed as a Freddie Mercury look-a-like. The evening was quite succesful! A sad note was that Martin,the singer of "N.A.T.O" will move to the USA which means that "N.A.T.O" will splitt up :-( But other bands will keep playing Queen Music, thus keeping the band alive!

taken during the F.M. Garden Party 1994
left: Joy Whitelock, right: Freddie van ter Beek (meaning:ME!)

QUEEN : A Night In Heaven, Bournemouth

The night after Birmingham we went south...destination: Bournemouth. In a place called The Pavilion Ballroom the Freddie Mercury Friendship Group organised a Queen Party. It was not the first party held there. They did it before last year and the year before. Known people from the Queenfanclub came also: Jacky Smith (Queen fanclub president) and Jim Jenkins (works for the fanclub and wrote "As It Began" together with Jacky). A special guest was Peter Freestone. This man was Freddie Mercury's personal assistent and a close friend of Freddie. He dressed Freddie Mercury before his funeral in 1991. He's a very gentle man and I think the best way to describe him is: a friendly giant! He's huge!
The audience sat on tables in the ballroom and a stage was build at one end of the room with many lights to show everybody who was on stage. First act of the evening was a live performance by a band called WIG WAM GLAM. A glitterrock band which performed songs from the early seventies like David Bowie, T-Rex, etc. They also payed some Queen songs. Ofcourse the members of the band were dressed like in those days...lots of glitter.
As usual an auction and raffle were held to earn money for the Mercury Phoenix Trust. Jim Jenkins did the auction in which hundreds of British Pounds were raised. As main act of the evening a band called "Command Performance" did a 40 mins MIME performance. They were dressed exactly like Queen and they had a huge light-show with smoke-bombs and firework-bombs. It was GREAT! The whole evening was filmed by a camera-crew from the BBC-college. They are making a documentary on the Queenparty!
The evening ended around 1am and ofcourse was over much too soon. I met many Queenfans, whom I met before at other party's and I was again dressed as Freddie Mercury. This time there was also a talent-competition in which I did a Mime-performance using "Hammer To Fall". I didn't win anything...:-( The 2 prizes went to a band of young teenagers (the singer/drummer was 12 years old!) and a guy who sung live.

Well, that were my Queenparties for the year 1996. I went to 6 in total (1 in Holland, 5 in England!). Next year I'll visit the Queen Convention and Dutch Queen Meeting (as usual). So expect more reports in the future!
Also Brian May and Roger Taylor are planning to tour next year! So, I might write some reports on some of their concerts too...... Greetz, Freddie