The Best Queen Programs | Golden Skate

The Best Queen Programs

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🎵 Queen on Ice: Which Ice Dance Program Hit All the Right Notes?

Queen's music has inspired a number of memorable skating programs over the years, from emotional ballads to energetic rock anthems. While their music is more common in exhibitions than in competition, several teams have taken on the challenge.

Which Queen program is your favorite?
  • Which skater/team captured the music best?
  • Was it a competitive program or an exhibition?
  • Is there a Queen song you've always wanted to see used?
Feel free to share videos, memories, and any lesser-known programs that deserve more recognition!
 
I cannot say if it's the best but the one that I remember best and liked the most "recently" is this LaLa's Free dance...
Maybe I am just nostalgic.
I'd be curious to know what Tat is talking about here ;).

 
For the first of what I am sure will be multiple posts from me in this thread, I want to highlight a couple of programmes to Queen songs that don't normally get skated to.

This season was the first time I saw "Mother Love" being skated to.

It was by one of the host country's Junior Men at the Denis Ten Memorial Challenge. Unfortunately, I can't find a video of that particular performance, so here he is doing it a few months earlier:

Semyon Reznik (KAZ) - 2025 Kazakhstani Summer Figure Skating Championships Junior Men's FS

Here is what I wrote about it at the time:


And the previous season was the first time I saw "The Millionaire Waltz" being skated to.

It was by one of the host country's Advanced Novice Ladies at the IceChallenge in Graz. Here she is within the archived livestream:

Sophie Schwartz (AUT) - 2024 IceChallenge Advanced Novice Ladies SP

Here is what I wrote about it at the time:


I would love to see more programmes to both of those songs!

Queen has such a good and extensive back-catalogue, so it is good to see skaters and choreographers starting to look beyond the usual half dozen songs that tend to be selected.

CaroLiza_fan
 
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I cannot say if it's the best but the one that I remember best and liked the most "recently" is this LaLa's Free dance...
Maybe I am just nostalgic.
I'd be curious to know what Tat is talking about here ;).


Normally I don't like Bohemian Rhapsody used by skaters who tend to ignore the lyrics, but I love the choreography of this performance, making use of every fast change in mood and pace.

I don't think there's any film available, thank goodness, but my partner and I have a show program we've enjoyed using often to "You're My Best Friend". I'd like to see a better longtime pair or dance couple use it for a gala, as long as I knew the emotion was genuine and not faked. Of past skaters, Underhill/Martini or Babilonia/Gardner spring to mind in pairs, or Torville/Dean or Wing/Lowe in dance.
 
Normally I don't like Bohemian Rhapsody used by skaters who tend to ignore the lyrics, but I love the choreography of this performance, making use of every fast change in mood and pace.

I don't think there's any film available, thank goodness, but my partner and I have a show program we've enjoyed using often to "You're My Best Friend". I'd like to see a better longtime pair or dance couple use it for a gala, as long as I knew the emotion was genuine and not faked. Of past skaters, Underhill/Martini or Babilonia/Gardner spring to mind in pairs, or Torville/Dean or Wing/Lowe in dance.

I don't mind it too much, but I've always wanted a full-on, in your face, head-banger version - a la Wayne and Garth. Not the symphonic watered-down versions. I don't recall seeing a program like that, although I always hoped Keven Reynolds would do one.
 
Kazuki Tomono's new Free Skate is to A Beautiful Day; for the competitive season, I'm half expecting a new top (contrasting more with the ice) and a few more Transitions; of course too, we're still off-season so the jumps were not all there yet (the video was initially posted by @cocteauwin in Kazuki Tomono's Fan Fest):
 
"Bohemian Rhapsody" is my favourite song of all time. But I normally hate programmes to it because, due to the nature of the song, it is very difficult to edit it down to the required length of the programme without absolutely butchering it.

But, there are a small number that I have liked.

There was a programme to a piano instrumental version that was my favourite for many years, but I can't remember who it was. Kirsten Moore-Towers went through my head, but the Queen programme she did with Dylan Moscovitch was a medley. Granted, it was an instrumental and started with "Bohemian Rhapsody", but it was an orchestral version rather than a piano version:

Kirsten Moore-Towers / Dylan Moscovitch (CAN) - 2013 World Championships FS

Maybe my memory is deceiving me about the programme I liked being to a piano version of "Bohemian Rhapsody", and that it was actually this programme that I was thinking of. Can anybody think of an alternative programme that it could be that would fit my description?

Anyway, here is what I wrote about their programme as part of a very long post in a wish thread from the end of that season:

Although it probably won’t happen (well, how often do you see a competitor keep the same routine for 2 seasons?), I wish that Kirsten Moore-Towers/Dylan Moscovitch would keep the Queen medley that they used for their FS this year. OK, so I’m probably biased because I’m a massive Queen fan, but that orchestra version of the songs was out of this world!!! Like, “Bohemian Rhapsody” is my favourite song of all time but that is the best version (apart from the original, of course) that I have ever heard!

But my current favourite is, appropriately enough, from the Blinking Queen:

Iida Karhunen (FIN) - 2024 Junior World Championships FS

Here is what I wrote about it at the time:


And as a Brucie Bonus, here is what I wrote when she did it at the Youth Olympics a month earlier:


Boys, but I love it!

CaroLiza_fan
 
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This thread reminds me of the war horse music lore series that The Runthrough podcast recently launched. 🥰 So far, they have discussed historical origins of Bolero (including brief composer bio relevant to the making of the music), plus the most notable skater performances through the years. They just posted a second entry for the series on Swan Lake / The Black Swan.

This episodic series by The Runthrough co-hosts, Adam Rippon, Ashley Wagner, NBC Sports producer, Sarah Hughes [not the famous skater], accompanied by NBC Sports' bts research staffer, Michelle Ellis (who often co-hosts on Jackie Wong's Rocker Skating podcast), is surprsingly thorough, revealing, and well-researched, along with lots of witty good humor on the side. 😂

Perhaps war horse music by Queen, used often by skaters, will be included in this summer's Runthrough music lore series.
 
Didn't someone use Who Wants To Live Forever as a brief part of their program this past season? Or is my memory going. :scratch2: I can't even remember which discipline it was in, just that the melody popped up among others in a mix.

Edit: Maxim Naumov
 
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Minority view, I’m sure, but I was never a fan to begin with, and now am heartily sick of hearing Queen in skating programs.

You are not alone. ;)

Didn't like Queen then, don't like them now. I'm not your mama and I don't care if you're on death row, just end the song already. :cautious: (I do like "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" but that seems unusual for Queen).

But musical taste is musical taste, and people who like those programs can get to enjoy them.

However, if I need to watch another "Who wants to skate forever" program (yes I know what I did there) my laptop screen may not survive
 
Shen & Zhao's 2010 SP to "Who Wants to Live Forever." Lyrics weren't allowed then. Having said that, by now I am tired of people skating to that song, or to any Queen song.
 
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