When I saw that Prince(The Artist at the time) was going to be on Oprah I knew it would not go that well but then Oprah got to request a song while he was at the piano. I am thinking this will save the show. Then she says...."Can I hear a little bit of Purple Rain"?. That is when I lost it and damn near jumped off the nearest bridge. She could have at least asked for something off "Emancipation". Purple Rain? OMG!!! He has a million songs and this is what she asks for!!!!I am still mad at her about this.

If you were Oprah in that moment what would you have asked for?

...defintely a medley.

Actually that made me cringe when she asked him that too....and I thought the SAME thing....all 'em damn songs on Emanciption and she asks for PR??!!

Agreed. However, I thought he handled it very well. Smiled, and played a nice melody.

Prince was and is a class act

SHOCKADELICA1 said:

The whole performance was great though..

But Oprah looked sorry as hell when he sang Do Me, Baby her expression was priceless. I get the sense it was a practical humor from Mr.Nelson to perform that song for THAT show.

yeah well of all the songs prince could have played he chose 'sleep around' and he lip synched it .. LAME ... i'll take a piano version of purple rain anytime thats for sure ... the do me baby into 'if i was your girlfriend was great tho ... good to hear some good tunes on oprah queen of the material dream .. otherwise known as the worst faker of sincerity of all time ...

at least she requested purple rain instead of we gets up

Actually if memory serves me right, didn't he start to play something without her asking & said "guess what it is" or something like that? & then she said "Can i hear a bit of purple rain" meaning the tune he chose to play was that?

MyNameIsCally said:

I don't believe that's what happened. They were talking, and he sat at the piano in Studio A. She said, off handedly, "Can I hear a little bit of Purple Rain", and he obliged. I don't remember the "guess what it is" moment.

I don't think it was a cringe worthy moment. As much as Oprah probably likes Prince, she is not going to be familiar enough w/ his catalog to ask for a few bars of "Free" or "The Ladder". She's a Top 40 fan, like most of the folks in that audience. Oprah doesn't really plan a lot of questions, and usually asks things off the cuff. I like that approach with any interviewer, because it's a bit more spontaneous and free, than Barbara Walters glancing down at her cards for questions. If a person is talking about how their childhood was fucked up, why change the subject and ask "If you could be a tree, what tree would you be?"

ernestsewell said:

Here's a transcript I found of the interview, specifically that part:

OPRAH: Well, one of my favorite experiences at Paisley Park was going to the place where The Artist creates his music.

0{+> : Let me show you my piano.

OPRAH: What are you going to play for me?

0{+> : What do you want to hear?

OPRAH: Can I hear a little bit of "Purple Rain"? We have a purple piano. ( plays "Purple Rain" on the piano)

OPRAH: Thank you for doing that.

0{+> : You're welcome.

My point is her asking for PR is like someone asking her to do her lines from "The Color Purple". That might be what you are most familiar with but if you have a once in a lifetime opportunity before you would you ask her to say "You told Harpo to beat me" ?

ernestsewell said:

Ah my bad, it was a long time ago when I watched it
Yeah Purple Rain is an obvious choice considering he's not playing to his usual audience & has to keep it relativley familiar as to not confuse them. Plus it might have been a long time since the audience actually cared about Prince's music & Purple Rain could have braught all the good memories flooding back, promting them to buy the albums wink wink

alright, Total Praise, Richard Smallwood.

ernestsewell said:

I would have probably asked for PR cuz it is my number one song

I love the way Prince plays PR on the piano. Those chords sound so beautiful together in any form and his piano arrangement of it is gorgeous.

i love watching anything featuring the Park-i find myself looking at the surroundings rather than P or Oprah-liked the hey hey and a big hug as he greeted her to his house

there are aspects i hate about this particular show-but overall-i enjoyed more than i hated

but man do i hate sleep around-as a tune and a performance-i even hated his suit-and those AWFUL lace pants and oversize polo neck-no Prince

NO

polkadotbliss said:

I loved Prince's big sweaters during that time. There was another picture out around that time w/ a gray sweater, high turtle neck. It was still stylish, but toned town a bit. I loved his hair during this time too.

I loved the purple suit he wore during "Sleep Around", and as a live song it worked really good. (It was one of many examples of a song that works much better live than on an album.)

I know this will be odd, and it's all conjecture on my part, and I know it wasn't purposeful on Prince's part, but - those big sweaters reflected his attitude at the time, if you think about it. Sweaters are big, keep you warm, are very comfy, still stylish, and come in many styles etc. He found his sweater in Mayte.

He was at a relatively good place in his life. He was married, happy, making good music, making good love songs. He had the warmth and comfort of a woman he truly loved, in his life. He was comfortable, but still had the girls wanting him. He had been through many women, but found one that fit him like a tailor made glove. That's all just psycho-babble, but I found it interesting.

Emancipation is one of my favorite Prince-looks times. I loved the green outfit on one of the "Somebody's Somebody" two-disk single. He also wore big warm overcoats like he did during the Parade years, which was a nice, unintended, homage to the past.

LOL

a nice way of seeing things-i kinda like that spin on it

I'd ask for She spoke to me.

Maybe she heard the emancipation album, and thats why she asked for Purple Rain...Lol
Just kidding..kinda.
I would have asked the same thing. Purple Rain on piano is amazing!

"The Beautiful Ones"

I would love to hear Soul Santuary on the piano.

veronikka said:

ernestsewell said:

Wasn't this when she asked him what was the first song he ever played on the piano? Or if he still remembered the first song he learned? And he dove into the Batman theme song from the 70's...Lord, it's been forever since I seen this...I'll have to dust off my VCR to check it out once again.

Revolution said:

Both happened.

This move by Oprah obviously pissed off only the die hards.

But as for the general audience? They saw this request as only natural.
Give em a break, they know nothing else.

--
as for myself, I think hearing how come you don't call me or rasberry beret would have been fun

SHOCKADELICA1 said:

Because it's miles better than all of those songs combined.

A simple question: how many of those songs has Prince ever played live? How many of them in the past ten years?

This is weird, but can so many people be completely wrong about this?


For me, everytime I watched that interview it never looked as if she actually asked for PR; he played something on the piano and she said "I can hear a bit of Purple Rain in there...", as if she just recognised the chords. That's it.



How come so many people think otherwise?