There may already be a topic about this, but the search isn't working. So does anyone know if he does or not?

I remember him saying for a long time he couldn't, but he eventually learned how to. It was around the time of the Oprah interview.
[Edited 6/25/07 14:50pm]

No, he doesn't.

Genesia said:

Just wondering, what's your source?

Genesia said:

I would seriously doubt that he still doesn't. Again, this was true at one time, but he's since had to provide charts for too many projects involving musicians who only read and don't play by ear. Sure, he could hire someone to chart for him, but not at all likely for a control freak, not to mention, it needs to be done right to get the performance spot on.

I mean, i suppose it's possible. Figure James Brown never read music,he always had a musician who was fluent in theory and that could read on-hand, and james brown was as much if not more of a control freak as prince.

I dont remember the remarks he made during the Oprah interview, but Prince has stated several times during interviews that he is an autodidact, meaning: he doesnt read music, he plays it by 'ear'.

That also should mean he is something with "absolute hearing": something that is often common among autistic people who are active with music. I am not saying with that, that he is autistic, but his obsessiveness with music and his capabilities to produce the music he hears in his 'mind' without using transcripts, always makes me think a lot about "idiots savants".

On the other hand: he often uses cues while leading his band: Vegas in B, Turnaround on the C etc. That means he has at least knowledge of use of the note-scale in his music.

But it might be that his bandmembers use transcripted parts to learn and play their parts, and that he himself doenst need transcripts to play his parts,

On the Today show (Down under version I believe) he said that he doesn't know how to read music. This was just a few years ago, during the Musicology tour. I have this on tape but I have also seen it on the web. He is sitting and the band is sitting around him and at one point Maceo was talking about how great Prince was and Prince turned and said "your not getting a raise." The host/interviewer asked the question " Can you read music" and Prince said "no."

I was shocked ... ... I use to dog Diddy because he couldn't read music ... In all the movies and some vids he always had music sheets ... maybe that is why he has forgoten a few licks here and there (according to D'Angelo and dang..what's that brotha's name????).

Peace

prime said:

I saw that interview. I was shocked too.

I have my doubts.

I mean, I know him as a guy that feels the music flow through him and he just shows which notes to play or which keys to press. He just knows. He might know how to, but he chooses not to. I'm not quite sure.

It really helps u keep in mind how extraordinary he is.
This sounds like a weird thing to bring up, cuz we're talking about Prince. We were watching some top 40 song list on VH1 and one of the songs was by Lionel Richie and my dad said "not bad for a guy that doesn't know how to read music". So this puts Prince at least in the same class of excellence of Lionel Richie, although Prince really is in a class by himself (that's why I thought it was kinda of weird to bring up)... but still.

I always knew Prince was extraordinary and this is just one of those many reasons why.

I'm pretty sure he doesn't. There's this scene in Graffiti Bridge where he's holding this computer printout of some sheet music, if you look real close you can see the song is called "God is Alive". It always cracks me up cause I wonder who he's gonna give it to. "Yo, Michael B, here are all the hits for Tick Tick Bang, and you better read 'em right this time m'f***er!". I guess Tommy Barbarella could read with his classical background, or Rosie. But I can't really see PRince working up all his tracks in MIDI in advance so he could print scores for everyone. It'd be more like "It goes like this!" and then he plays something unreal! "Got that?"

indianguitar52 said:

I saw an interview he did with Australian TV the last time he toured there. (2003, I think?) The interviewer asked Prince a direct question about whether he read music -- and he said he didn't.

At this point in his life, does it matter?

i think he does know how, he just chooses not to.

so the answer to the question is no. he doesnt read music

No.

I'm actually more surprised that some people still don't know this or are shocked by it. I never thought that Prince would sit down and learn it, when he could just get up and do it. Actually, I recently had a little argument with someone who couldn't believe that a lot of musicians, like Paul McCartney cannot read music, and who said that you're not really a musician if you can't and stuff like that.

christ how many times will this be a thread...
is the search function still broken,
somebody for christ sake fix it!

PurpleCharm said:

I saw that interview also, but it was a longtime ago so It's kind of blurry on what I remember,

Here is the old thread:

http://www.prince.org/msg/7/199019

And here are some of my posts again, they might as well be repeated:
_ _ _

This is how it is:

- Whether or not being able to read music has nothing to do with the ability to play.

- Playing "by ear" and reading music are not in any way opposites (all good musicians use their ears just as much while reading as well).

- It is possible to have a good understanding of music theory without actually knowing how to read or write music.

- Whether or not being able to write sheet music has nothing to do with the ability to compose.

Personally, I'm a hundred percent sure that Prince can not read music. 
And while we're at it: he can't play the saxophone either...
_ _ _

People who are not musicians tend to be fascinated by the language of musical notation (just like looking at Chinese writing, or whatever language you don't understand). This thread proves the point exactly...

To the uninitiated, the simplest sheet music can look very advanced, and I assume it was used in the movie [Graffiti Bridge] to imply some kind of "genius" status...although that actually has nothing to do with it.
_ _ _

The fact that Prince (just like most other major artists) can not read music doesn't say anything about his "talent" - actually, it says more about the capabilities of the people he works with.

Musical notation, whether it's notes on a staff or chord symbols or whatever, is a language. A way of communicating. Of course there are other ways to present musical information - like playing it to someone, showing it, or recording it. What method works best depends very much on the circumstances and the people involved. Once again, this has nothing to do with talent!

Since Prince creates and performs almost exclusively his own music, he usually doesn't need to take in any musical information, but only give out information to the people he's playing with. And since he is not only the leader, but also a major star, he can communicate that information any way he likes. If he wants to paint it with watercolors or make signals with his eyebrows or call out chord changes in Swahili, it's up to the recipient to interpret and understand it.

Knowing the complexity (and pure extent) of Prince's music, there is a lot of musical information that must have passed from him to his bandmembers - which probably means that either he's very good at communicating his ideas, or his musicians are very good at taking in the information.
[Edited 6/27/07 1:33am]