-----Disclaimer. Please READ!!!!!-----
First you might want to turn your Bass down a bit on your speakers, it got boomy in the auditorium. Second, I know I'm not Freddie Mercury (nobody is or ever will be) so please refrain from flaming this vid with "that singer SUX!!! What a n00b! I bET fredde Mercury is roling in his grave! Epic Phail!!!!1!!1!!1!" I was the one who could hit his high notes in a chest voice without going into falsetto (because I am a tiny man) so that's the part I sang. I did my best, and tried not to overdo it because I wanted the focus to be on the instrumental parts and the kids as much as possible. Thank you for your time.
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This piece was recorded March 2008 at Denton High School in Denton, TX, while I was the percussion instructor there.

When I asked my students what's the one piece they would love to play, they all shouted "Bohemian Rhapsody!". At first I resisted, because I had heard so many instrumental arrangements before, and even though some were very good, like when Carolina Crown did it, they just never had the magic of the original.

Freddie Mercury's overdubbed amazing voice is what that song is all about, so I thought about how I could recreate that. I had also heard some full choir versions, but the harmonies are so dense and complex, that having that many people on each part just made it impossible to keep in tune it seemed. I finally decided on 5 voices (6 in the middle) each on a microphone, and nobody singing in unison except for the jam in the middle.

Even with this, it was incredibly hard to transcribe the vocals perfectly, let alone try to sing them in tune. The more I delved into it, the more I started to think Freddie must have written this stuff out to have it orchestrated so well, but who knows. I'm sure a professional barbershop group could have done better, but we did alright in the end I think, after some long and difficult rehearsals.

The rest of the piece transferred perfectly to mallet instruments, and I had one of my percussion students play the guitar part as well. I don't know of anyone else in the world who's actually tried to recreate the "studio" version of this song, with all of the vocal overdubs and the band parts along with it, so I was excited to do something unique like this, and everyone had a complete blast playing it.

Brady Beavers -(percussion)
Christina Burtch -(marimba)
Joanna Ceja -(marimba & vocals in the middle)
Charles Crouch -(marimba)
Bailey Gardner -(bass marimba)
Cody Goble -(vibes)
Will Huslig -(electric guitar)
Bobby Jacobs -(drumset)
Ryan Klinck -(marimba)
Manuel Ortiz -(vibes)
C.J. Porras -(xylo and crotales)
Will Reedy -(vibes)
Holly Robinson -(chimes)
David Ross -(vibes)
Charlie Tucker -(bass marimba)
Zachary Winrow -(bells)
Brandon Arthur -(electric bass)
Hee-Jun Kim -(electric piano)

Jesse Woolery -(Asst. Band Director - vocals)
Boomer West -(DHS choir - vocals)
Michael Pricer -(Asst. Choir Director - vocals)
Sid Arlikatti -(DHS Choir - vocals)
Sean Redman -(vocals)

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