{"id":1606,"date":"2013-05-05T16:14:47","date_gmt":"2013-05-05T14:14:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/95.141.36.44\/apache2-default\/queenmuseum\/?p=1606"},"modified":"2026-07-21T17:07:01","modified_gmt":"2026-07-21T15:07:01","slug":"freddies-early-days-in-india-memories-from-a-school-mate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/queenmuseum.com\/?p=1606","title":{"rendered":"Freddie&#8217;s early days in India : memories from a school mate"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Some years ago I was contacted by one of Freddie\u2019s \u2014 or rather F. Bulsara\u2019s \u2014 school friends from his India period: Keith Wilson.<\/p>\n<p>He kindly allowed me to show a unique personal message that the future Freddie gave to him, and a full story to share with all his fans.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/queenmuseum.com\/?attachment_id=2748\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-2748\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter  wp-image-2748\" src=\"https:\/\/queenmuseum.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/06\/k_wilson_FREDDIE_Autograph_qm.jpg\" alt=\"k_wilson_FREDDIE_Autograph_qm\" width=\"538\" height=\"417\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<div><\/div>\n<p>****************************************************************<\/p>\n<p>Hi Ferdy,<\/p>\n<p>I first met Freddy when he came to our school, a boys boarding school, St Peter\u2019s in Panchgani, Bombay, India in 1956, I think. He was 1 year junior to me, and we both immediately bonded somehow<br \/>\nas we were both shy and timid boys. I can remember he had to wear a very painful brace on his teeth which he hated, and some boys were very unkind about that. Even from about the age of<br \/>\n12 he was very talented on the piano and would just play by ear anything he<br \/>\nhad heard.<\/p><div class=\"2416a19e08873d0076105f82e7f970da\" data-index=\"2\" style=\"float: none; margin:0px 0 0px 0; text-align:center;\">\n<script async src=\"https:\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/js\/adsbygoogle.js?client=ca-pub-6280590296994447\"\r\n     crossorigin=\"anonymous\"><\/script>\r\n<!-- quadrato -->\r\n<ins class=\"adsbygoogle\"\r\n     style=\"display:block;text-align:center;margin:0 auto;max-width:100%\"\r\n     data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-6280590296994447\"\r\n     data-ad-slot=\"6452889443\"\r\n     data-ad-format=\"auto\"\r\n     data-full-width-responsive=\"true\"><\/ins>\r\n<script>\r\n     (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});\r\n<\/script>\n<\/div>\n\n<p>He did take piano lessons I remember and might have learned the violin, but I\u2019m unsure about that. We used to sit at the piano and sing duets together of the hit songs of the day. We both had fantastic soprano voices and were both in the church choir. Incidentally we both used to compete in singing competitions and I remember even beating him in one. Imagine that! There was friendly rivalry however.<br \/>\nAs we grew older, he became more and more into his music and as you know formed a school band called the &#8220;Hectics&#8221;.<br \/>\nI did my final year in 1962 which is when he wrote those personal words to me in the autograph book, which was very popular amongst school kids at the time, and signed it as Farook Bulsara, his real name.<br \/>\nI went on to migrate to Australia where I live today, but still have very happy memories of those early years.<br \/>\nI hope you enjoy viewing this very personal and sentimental part of my life.<\/p>\n<p>Regards<\/p>\n<p>Keith Wilson<\/p>\n<p>PS: just to furnish some proof that it is genuine, I am also including a certificate to show that I was at the school at that time in 1962.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/queenmuseum.com\/?attachment_id=2752\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-2752\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-2752\" src=\"https:\/\/queenmuseum.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/06\/Keilson_STPreference_qm.jpg\" alt=\"Keilson_STPreference_qm\" width=\"500\" height=\"549\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"2416a19e08873d0076105f82e7f970da\" data-index=\"3\" style=\"float: none; margin:0px 0 0px 0; text-align:center;\">\n<script async src=\"https:\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/js\/adsbygoogle.js?client=ca-pub-6280590296994447\"\r\n     crossorigin=\"anonymous\"><\/script>\r\n<!-- stretto -->\r\n<ins class=\"adsbygoogle\"\r\n     style=\"display:block;text-align:center;margin:0 auto;max-width:100%\"\r\n     data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-6280590296994447\"\r\n     data-ad-slot=\"5886106757\"\r\n     data-ad-format=\"auto\"\r\n     data-full-width-responsive=\"true\"><\/ins>\r\n<script>\r\n     (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});\r\n<\/script>\n<\/div>\n\n<div style=\"font-size: 0px; height: 0px; line-height: 0px; margin: 0; padding: 0; clear: both;\"><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Some years ago I was contacted by one of Freddie\u2019s \u2014 or rather F. Bulsara\u2019s \u2014 school friends from his<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2748,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","footnotes":""},"categories":[25,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1606","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general","category-signed"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/queenmuseum.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1606","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/queenmuseum.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/queenmuseum.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/queenmuseum.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/queenmuseum.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1606"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/queenmuseum.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1606\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/queenmuseum.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2748"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/queenmuseum.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1606"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/queenmuseum.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1606"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/queenmuseum.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1606"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}