Purple Prose: Entertainment Industry Insiders Write About Encountering Prince

[KamaAina]

https://www.yahoo.com/music/purple-prose-entertainment-industry-insiders-211139527.html

Prince left an indelible impression on everyone he met, whether it was a random encounter at a club, party, or recording studio, or a friendship that spanned decades. Here, Yahoo Music offers some tributes from his friends, colleagues, and distant admirers, ranging from genuinely touching to downright hilarious....

Over the years – dinners, movies, parties, events, conversations – I was fortunate enough to get to know him. I don’t play a musical instrument or sing, so our relationship was based on old-fashioned conversation. The way someone treats me and those most important to me, sets the tone of my relationships. He welcomed not only me, but my whole family into his fold. When I mentioned my mom was in town, he immediately asked, “Does she want to see Barbra Streisand with us?” My mom ended up sitting next to him all night and chatting. From that point on, my mom was a regular guest at his house. He would also invite my husband, Tom, to join for us for dinner. At Tom’s first “dinner,” he and Prince were so engrossed in talking about intellectual property and ownership (Tom is an attorney) that they forgot to order and the restaurant closed. A few years later, I was lamenting about how I needed a big backyard for my daughter’s birthday bouncer. He graciously offered his house in Los Angeles. My daughter, Natasha, was always welcome at all his events and shows. When I told Natasha that Prince had passed away, she reflected for a moment and said, “Mama, I think he was one of your nicest artists. He let me eat all of his Oreos from the dressing room.”...

At Coachella 2008, I had the great fortune to be at a small gathering after the night had ended at a private home with Prince and eight other people. When I got there, I saw everyone huddled in a corner, while Prince and his bodyguard sat on the other side of the room, in complete silence. No one had the courage to go up and start a conversation with him. I found this weird, so I went up to him, and we started talking. He was extremely warm, and seemed happy I had approached him. We talked about music, surviving as an artist, songwriting, and life. He hugged me for a long time. Then I asked him how he had seemingly frozen time, looking, singing, and dancing exactly the same, without aging a bit. He smiled and said, "I’ll tell you my secret: I stopped counting.” I’ve always remembered that as a sage piece of advice from someone to whom age was just a random number. How ironic and tragic that he died so young. But – he wasn’t counting. He lived a life full of many more lifetimes than the average person will ever live, and obviously, will live on forever....

I was dancing as best I could in my chair and I began to sing along. In falsetto. Behind Prince. I wish I could say this was the first time that absent-minded singing has landed me in embarrassing situations, but it’s a regular thing. Most of the time I’m not aware that I’m doing it. Maybe it was the volume in the room and the high frequency was the only thing I could hear in my head, or maybe a Prince-like “woo woo” was what the music was calling for in my mind. Whatever the reason, I was mindlessly regurgitating my best Prince impression while he sat in front of me.

[cemaphonic]

1. Some good stories there. One of my favorite Prince stories from Joni Mitchell:

"Prince attended one of my concerts in Minnesota. I remember seeing him sitting in the front row when he was very young. He must have been about 15. He was in an aisle seat and he had unusually big eyes. He watched the whole show with his collar up, looking side to side. You couldn’t miss him—he was a little Prince-ling. [Laughs.] Prince used to write me fan mail with all of the U’s and hearts that way that he writes. And the office took it as mail from the lunatic fringe and just tossed it!"