What are all the songs he wrote about her?

Presumably:

If I Was Your Girlfriend

Forever In My Life

Adore

The Beautiful Ones (although I swear there was a discussion on this recently)

Big Tall Wall

In This Bed I Scream

It's often thought "Nothing Compares 2 U" was about her, but I remember reading it was allegedly about a breakup Jerome Benton had with his then-girlfriend. Others say it was his assistant or something.

"Strange Relationship" dates to 1982, so that probably isn't about her, not with that message. It certainly fits their relationship near the end, however.

She inspired a lot, either from the relationship or just conversations, like "Starfish and Coffee".

Empty Room.

luvgirl said:

Regarding the Beautiful Ones, In an article, Prince was annoyed that people keep saying the beautiful ones was written about Susannah Melovin. He refuted the claims and said that he specifically wrote the lyrics" Do you want him or do you want me" for the part where Morris and Apples were sitting around the table talking while he was performing on stage and he alluded to it being about Vanity. Also, in one of the Piano and Microphone shows after Vanity passed, he was very emotional and dedicated the song to her and said "She knows about this one" I think he's telling people loud and clear who the song was written for but no one seems to care, every one is still going by whoever their favorite Prince girl is, which is fine... That's one of the beauty of being a Prince fan. This is what he said: I was talking to somebody about “The Beautiful Ones.” They were speculating as to who I was singing about. But they were completely wrong. If they look at it, it’s very obvious. “Do you want him or do you want me,” that was written for that scene in Purple Rain specifically. Where Morris [Day] would be sitting with [Apollonia], and there’d be this back and forth. And also, “The beautiful ones you always seem to lose,” Vanity had just quit the movie. To then speculate, “Well, he wrote that song about me”? Afterwards you go, “Who are you? Why do you think that you’re part of the script that way? And why would you go around saying stuff like that?”

the story of Prince writing that song to woe Susannah from a relationship had to have come from the camp though. Maybe the song has multiple inspirations...

OldFriends4Sale said:

TrivialPursuit said:

luvgirl said:

OldFriends4Sale said:

the story of Prince writing that song to woe Susannah from a relationship had to have come from the camp though. Maybe the song has multiple inspirations...

Yes, I think I heard that it was Susan Rogers that said it, but if Prince said it wasn't about Susannah, I'm gonna go by what he says, cuz you know, he wrote the song, lol. And he didn't have a problem with saying other songs were written about Susannah, like 'Forever In My Life' and he didn't refute any of the other songs reputedly written about her, just 'The Beautiful Ones.' Plus, I don't think he would have alluded to it being about Vanity in the dedication he made to her at the Piano and Microphone show if it really wasn't. I don't think he would have pointed out "She knows about this one" at such an emotional moment if it wasn't true just to flout Susannah Melvoin after thirty years. I agree that the song had multiple inspirations, he said so himself. [Edited 10/5/16 7:19am]

Weeellll Prince also said Morris Day fired Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis lol

I really do believe Prince said inspired things and wrote inspired notes that Susan Rogers was privy to

OldFriends4Sale said:

luvgirl said:

Regarding The Beautiful Ones. In an article, Prince was annoyed that people kept saying 'The Beautiful Ones' was written about Susannah Melovin. He refuted the claims and said that he specifically wrote the lyrics "Do you want him or do you want me" for the part where Morris and Apples were sitting around the table talking while he was performing on stage, and he alluded to other parts of the song being about Vanity. Also, in one of the Piano and Microphone shows after Vanity passed, he was very emotional and dedicated the song to her and said "She knows about this song" I think he's telling people loud and clear who the song was written for but no one seems to care, everyone is still going by whoever their favorite Prince girl is, which is fine... That's one of the beauty of being a Prince fan. This is what he said: I was talking to somebody about “The Beautiful Ones.” They were speculating as to who I was singing about. But they were completely wrong. If they look at it, it’s very obvious. “Do you want him or do you want me,” that was written for that scene in Purple Rain specifically. Where Morris [Day] would be sitting with [Apollonia], and there’d be this back and forth. And also, “The beautiful ones you always seem to lose,” Vanity had just quit the movie. To then speculate, “Well, he wrote that song about me”? Afterwards you go, “Who are you? Why do you think that you’re part of the script that way? And why would you go around saying stuff like that?” [Edited 10/5/16 6:46am]

Yep, I knew I'd read that recently about TBO somewhere, but wasn't going to scour the web for it.

Back in the day, my buddy Steve thought it was about Vanity, then years later a lot were saying it was about Susannah.

anangellooksdown said:

BillieBalloon said:

Wasn't Adore about that woman he had a crush on..what was her name? A singer, Patrice Rushen?

I've never heard that. His earlier stuff was, like "I Feel For You", "I Wanna Be Your Lover", etc, presumably.