The massive success of the film Bohemian Rhapsody — which fared surprisingly well at this year’s Academy Awards ceremony, winning four Oscars (the most of any movie) — has seen a major resurgence of interest in the music of Rock and Roll Hall of Famers Queen. That says a lot considering the lasting endurance of the group’s music, which has continued to be played live to millions of fans at packed concerts all over the world, with the surviving band members touring with Freddie Mercury stand-ins Paul Rodgers and, more recently, Adam Lambert.
Another popular Queen-related event that has helped keep the band’s music in the forefront is the Rock musical We Will Rock You, which premiered in London’s West End in 2002 and, according to press materials, has been seen by more than 16 million people in 19 countries since then. Brian May and Roger Taylor of Queen were music supervisors for the show, which isn’t biographical like Bohemian Rhapsody, instead operating as a jukebox musical to tell a separate story.
We Will Rock You is the 15th longest-running musical ever in London’s West End and beginning this September it will be traveling across North America for a series of one-off stagings. That will include a Nov. 27 visit to Cincinnati’s Taft Theater.
Tickets ($32.50-$64.50) for We Will Rock You at the Taft go on sale this Friday (April 5) at 11 a.m.
Click here for more details on the Cincinnati tour stop.
Canada’s Annerin Theatricals is staging the revival. In a statement it says the story is “a quirky, eccentric and heartfelt story of outsiders, it’s also a creative cautionary tale for the cyberage. It reflects the scale and spectacle that marked Queen’s live performances and earned the band its pinnacle position in rock history.
“The audience can expect We Will Rock You to rock as fiercely as the best of Queen’s concerts.”
This article appears in Mar 27 – Apr 3, 2019.