Ozzy Osbourne\u2019s funeral cortege is to pass through his home city of Birmingham on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
The hearse will travel along Broad Street to Black Sabbath Bridge and the Black Sabbath bench \u2013 the sites of thousands of messages, floral tributes and vigils following the metal star\u2019s death last week at the age of 76 <\/a>\u2013 at 1pm BST.<\/p>\n Lord Mayor Zafar Iqbal said: \u201cIt was important to the city that we support a fitting, dignified tribute ahead of a private family funeral. We know how much this moment will mean to his fans.\u201d<\/p>\n The Osbourne family has paid for the event and all associated costs, and Osbourne\u2019s wife, Sharon, and children Kelly and Jack \u2013 possibly among his other children \u2013 will follow the procession before the private funeral later in the day, the details of which have not been made public.<\/p>\n The local brass band Bostin Brass will soundtrack the procession, with members of Black Sabbath and the musician Yungblud thought to be taking roles. Fans at home will be able to watch the procession via an ongoing live stream of the Sabbath bench<\/a>.<\/p>\n Fans from across the world \u2013 including the Canadian R&B megastar Drake, who was passing through the city on tour \u2013 have travelled to Birmingham<\/a> to pay their respects to Osbourne. Iqbal said that he had been moved by accompanying fans in a line to sign a book of condolences, and that Osbourne had put \u201cBirmingham on the map. He put Aston on the map.\u201d<\/p>\n In June, Osbourne and Black Sabbath were given the Freedom of the City ahead of their Back to the Beginning gig,<\/a> a mammoth, all-star show paying tribute to Osbourne as he and Black Sabbath gave their final live performance. The event raised more than \u00a31m for local charities fundraising for children\u2019s causes and treatment of Parkinson\u2019s, which Osbourne was diagnosed with in 2003.<\/p>\n Evoking David Bowie\u2019s death just days after the release of his final album, Blackstar, in 2016, Osbourne died 17 days after the performance, at home in Buckinghamshire.<\/p>\n Thousands of fans are expected to attend the event: Birmingham council has encouraged mourners to turn up early, and roads will close from 7am. A book of condolences will remain open at the Birmingham Museum and Art gallery, where the exhibition Ozzy Osbourne (1948-2025): Working Class Hero<\/a> remains open.<\/p>\n In 2011, Osbourne told the Times what he hoped for from his funeral. He didn\u2019t care about the music, he said. \u201cBut I want to make sure it\u2019s a celebration, not a mope-fest.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ozzy Osbourne\u2019s funeral cortege is to pass through his home city of Birmingham on Wednesday. The hearse will…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":102737,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[51,50,52],"class_list":{"0":"post-102736","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-stories"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114937949314184501","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102736","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=102736"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102736\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/102737"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=102736"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=102736"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=102736"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}