How important is the fact that Prince grew up in Minneapolis to his music, mentality and personality? How have his origins shaped him as an artist and person?

Very important, and a lot...next question?

how important is background for most great artists? It's everything.

Every factor of someone's upbringing molds them, there's be no Prince without his background.

The titty-hardening cold here has spawned many great musicians and artists by forcing them into warm, creative seclusion 5 months out of the year.

squirrelgrease said:

The titty-hardening cold here has spawned many great musicians and artists by forcing them into warm, creative seclusion 5 months out of the year.

You mean they don't hibernate with the rest of the bears?

Yes

Maybe I wasn't specific enough - what I mean is if Prince had grown up in say Chicago or St Louis do you think he would have a different attitude towards music since Minneapolis is largely a white city. Have the extreme weather conditions in Minneapolis shaped him in the way say, the environment of Norway has produced black metal or the rain has influenced the gloomy outlook of some artists in northern England or maybe grunge in Seattle?

bigbrother said:

Maybe I wasn't specific enough - what I mean is if Prince had grown up in say Chicago or St Louis do you think he would have a different attitude towards music since Minneapolis is largely a white city. Have the extreme weather conditions in Minneapolis shaped him in the way say, the environment of Norway has produced black metal or the rain has influenced the gloomy outlook of some artists in northern England or maybe grunge in Seattle?

your question was clear to me, and my answer is the same, yes.

Prince grew up in a black community and went to a largely black high school, so the "white" factor is only a matter of perception to those that don't know the make-up of Minneapolis in the 1970s. Coming from this new angle posed by the OP, the fact that radio was almost entirely rock on the FM side with pop, disco and oldies on AM, maybe it skewed his tastes a bit in that regard much more than how racially diverse the city was.

was it really true that city only was 1% black? i remember reading that and thought that was weird and hard to believe.