It’s still hard to believe that the legendary artist Prince is gone. The artist died in 2016 and he’s still mourned by fans from all over the world. Prince was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota in 1958, the son of Mattie Della, a jazz singer, and John Lewis Nelson, who was a songwriter and pianist. Believe it or not, Prince is his real name. His father’s stage name was Prince Rogers, and he used the name when singing in a group with Prince’s mom called the Prince Rogers Trio. Nelson told the TV show “A Current Affair” that he named his son Prince so that he could do everything that he himself had ever wanted to do.
However, Prince didn’t love his name. When he was growing up, he wanted to be called by his nickname, Skipper.” That name stuck and his close friends called him that. When Prince was in high school, he was trained at the Minnesota Dance Theatre in ballet, and he grew to become a huge supporter of dancers in general. In fact, he used his own wealth to save Chicago’s ailing Joffrey Ballet in the 1990s. He wrote his first song when he was seven years old and titled it “Funk Machine.” In his long career, Prince integrated several different styles, including R&B, funk, new wave, rock, classical, pop, jazz, hip hop, and even Latin.
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In 2004, Prince was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, where he joined fellow musicians Jeff Lynne of ELO, Tom Petty, and Dhani Harrison. The stars gathered together onstage to play George Harrison’s song, “While My Guitar Gently Weeps.” Linn and Petty did all the of the vocals for the performance and Prince stepped forward near the end and played a guitar solo that has gone down in history as one of the greatest live guitar performances of all time.
Recently, the photographer JAGTenthPlanet, who captured the original footage, re-edited it to make a “Director’s Cut.” Watch it below.
Here is the original performance.
