It's just like his voice, there are tons of people who are 'better' singers than him, but I don't think a single one of them could have recorded The Beautiful Ones, Darling Nikki etc and have it come anywhere near as close to what Prince delivered on such tracks. The emotion, the energy, the balls, the edge is what makes him stand out in that regard. I don't think many people would have even thought to scream the last verse of Kiss and put it out as a pop single, and even if they did think about it they wouldn't have the guts to actually go though with it, know what I mean? That's what is really special about Prince and his music in my opinion.

He was exactly as good as he needed to be to realise his vision and ideas. It's completely ridiclous to point at OTHER PEOPLES WORK and say Prince couldn't do that, because as Prince himself once said 'could they do Housequake?'. It's irrelevant. He was an absolutely fantastic musician.

dandan said:

I think he had a great deal of technical ability. That being said, his voice is great to me because of its range, tone, and expressiveness..but there are better technical singers with bigger voices. There are better piano players but he is still very good. There are technically more proficient guitar players but not many.. Prince's solos have feeling and freedom but they also have restraint. They fit the emotion of the song and they are melodic. MUsician9 is disgruntled ex-fan who dislikes a lot of his later material, but live prince (IMO)was better as he got older. Its LIve where the musical chops are more apparent.

Back to technical ability I used to be a big Sinatra fan and Sinatra once said about his talent that there were better technical singers than himself (even amongst crooners of his day) but few were as expressive or connected to the meaning of his songs as he was. Prince's choices as a singer (in some ways this could also be said about Frank) were more important than his prowess. He made good musical choices singing wise. He used restraint or he let restraint go but to great effect. He worked on his voice and improved it over the years. Before his death he sounded just as good as ever (the same couldnt be said abotu Sinatra when he was 57 years old)

dandan said:

It's just like his voice, there are tons of people who are 'better' singers than him, but I don't think a single one of them could have recorded The Beautiful Ones, Darling Nikki etc and have it come anywhere near as close to what Prince delivered on such tracks. The emotion, the energy, the balls, the edge is what makes him stand out in that regard. I don't think many people would have even thought to scream the last verse of Kiss and put it out as a pop single, and even if they did think about it they wouldn't have the guts to actually go though with it, know what I mean? That's what is really special about Prince and his music in my opinion.

He was exactly as good as he needed to be to realise his vision and ideas. It's completely ridiclous to point at OTHER PEOPLES WORK and say Prince couldn't do that, because as Prince himself once said 'could they do Housequake?'. It's irrelevant. He was an absolutely fantastic musician.

purplerabbithole said:

i know the question is regarding piano. But i am curious could prince play classical guitar?

i know regular guitar is mostly chords right?? and classical is playing every note. do pop

musicians typicaly know how to play in the classical style? in his guitar solo in Purple Rain

isn't a portion of that solo playing the electric guitar in the classical style, although he is using

a pick and not fingers. can anyone tell me if there are songs where he is playing in the classical style/

playing every note. i have never seen him walk his fingers on the strings like in classical and i know

he used a pick. thx to anyone who may know.

purplefam99 said:

i know the question is regarding piano. But i am curious could prince play classical guitar?

i know regular guitar is mostly chords right?? and classical is playing every note. do pop

musicians typicaly know how to play in the classical style? in his guitar solo in Purple Rain

isn't a portion of that solo playing the electric guitar in the classical style, although he is using

a pick and not fingers. can anyone tell me if there are songs where he is playing in the classical style/

playing every note. i have never seen him walk his fingers on the strings like in classical and i know

he used a pick. thx to anyone who may know.

prince had nothing in common as a guitarist with classical players beyond using the common language all musicians would use, scales etc.., Most rock guitarist have nothing in common with classical guitarist although there are some heavy metal guitarist's i've heard where it's obvious they've done some classical training.

listening to more of the p&m stuff, dude was pure americana as a pianist, i was thinking "if i didn't know this was prince, and just came across a guy playing like this out in public my mind would still be blown".

PeteSilas said:

Every single artist out there has something unique to offer, let's appreciate and be thankful for the great and wonderful musical variety we've got.

typical P thread, half the responses are not related to the subject at hand then they steer the convo off into defensive territory, example here, well, P had a great voice, what the hell are you people on? The topic is clear so let the opinions flow, but no, the apostles of P step forward, angry that others don't fawn over every note and fart of their music lord, to change the subject to their liking. And the post about P and classical guitarists? R U serious? Sadly, yes, that person was serious and believes there is something remotely classical in Purple Rain, I once thought I'd find rational discussions about music, equipment and recording techniques on here, but alas...

Musician9 said:

purplefam99 said:

Musician9 said:

typical P thread, half the responses are not related to the subject at hand then they steer the convo off into defensive territory, example here, well, P had a great voice, what the hell are you people on? The topic is clear so let the opinions flow, but no, the apostles of P step forward, angry that others don't fawn over every note and fart of their music lord, to change the subject to their liking. And the post about P and classical guitarists? R U serious? Sadly, yes, that person was serious and believes there is something remotely classical in Purple Rain, I once thought I'd find rational discussions about music, equipment and recording techniques on here, but alas...

You thought it, but came back?? That isn’t rational.

that's why i told you guys to stop making threads asking about "how good was prince at x" because it's too much temptation for some guys. I had a music teacher, brilliant guy, awesome ability but no balls, he'd rather be taken care of by the school than take a chance on his own talent vs. the world, he never had a good thing to say about anyone who "made it" and once, when there was just a glimmer, not even a ray, just a glimmer that I'd be more than I was, he turned on me so goddamned fast it spun both of our heads, shit was wierd. Musicians are wierd.

Musician9 said:

typical P thread, half the responses are not related to the subject at hand then they steer the convo off into defensive territory, example here, well, P had a great voice, what the hell are you people on? The topic is clear so let the opinions flow, but no, the apostles of P step forward, angry that others don't fawn over every note and fart of their music lord, to change the subject to their liking. And the post about P and classical guitarists? R U serious? Sadly, yes, that person was serious and believes there is something remotely classical in Purple Rain, I once thought I'd find rational discussions about music, equipment and recording techniques on here, but alas...

U R a bit confusing, that's all. In your mind technical abilities equals good, timeless, classical songwriting. You refuse to accept that that there is indeed something classical in Purple Rain,why is that? R U some academic snob? When technicallity became requirement 4 good songwriting? In reality effort to compose, arrange, produce, sing and deliver something like - for example 'Call My Name' can equal to effort playing Chopin's 24 Preludes.

And maybe U R right, this isn't the best place 4 discussion on that level. Maybe steve hoffman music 4ums or something similar is better choice. Some ppl here have ❤ 4 P. bigger than... his technical abilites, so it comes

Musician9 said:

typical P thread, half the responses are not related to the subject at hand then they steer the convo off into defensive territory, example here, well, P had a great voice, what the hell are you people on? The topic is clear so let the opinions flow, but no, the apostles of P step forward, angry that others don't fawn over every note and fart of their music lord, to change the subject to their liking. And the post about P and classical guitarists? R U serious? Sadly, yes, that person was serious and believes there is something remotely classical in Purple Rain, I once thought I'd find rational discussions about music, equipment and recording techniques on here, but alas...

I sort of agree with you but not on opinions flowing. The last thing we need on a thread like this is opinions. What we need is knowledge.

.

The only thing that bothers me about those threads is that the only people who should reply are people who know what they're talking about. Same with that recent thread about musically challenging things in P's music. I really wish someone who plays the piano or truly understands what piano playing involves could actually explain to me why Prince was good, or not that good, or better than the average but not as good as Diana Krall or Keith Jarrett, and so on. Same with that other thread, I really wish people with solid knowledge of music theory could explain to me why such or such song is interesting, like someone actually did by describing the chord changes in Take Me With U in details. But that was only one usueful contribution in the whole thread!

.

But we usually end-up with a lot of people giving their opinion, without providing anything relevant to support it because they don't have the knowledge. And after 5 to 10 pages of people saying nothing and not answering the OP's question, the thread is left to die and quickly forgotten

.

IDK, we can also have a thread about quantum physics and have every office worker, literature teacher, lawyer, plumber and hairdresser here giving their opinion on quantum physics. People sure have opinions. But we still won't have learned a thing about quantum physics in the end...

I don't think you have to play an instrument necessarily to recognize talent anymore than you have to be a gymnast to realize what they do is very difficult. I'm no guitarist but I can listen to some hendrix and to me it sounds like that damned thing is directly fused to his soul in a way no else had it. As a pianist, depends on genre, classical music is extremely demanding as far as technique, repertoire, probably more than any other genre. very perfectionistic but also very uncreative for most of the top people, they are supposed to play it exactly how they are supposed to play it and no different, of course there will always be different styles of play because everyone is different but you aren't supposed to be changed notes and shit. Jazz is way more open, way more harmonically diverse and they have still have something that classical music left behind a while ago; improvisation. also, i a few mistakes here and there won't have anyone calling you overrated. I told my jazz teacher that i heard oscar peterson making a lot of mistakes and he said "a ton of them" as if it meant nothing in jazz. In classical, the snobs would never have that but Oscar is arguably the greatest jazz pianist ever. Now, Prince, harmonically, of course he wasn't doing anything as advanced as the most advanced jazz players, technically, he wasn't doing things or playing as fast, as fluid or as powerful as i've heard the best classical pianists (then again, i've rarely even heard prince play a real piano, most of them were keyboards which don't translate the same as pianos) even watching the clip on youtube of prince taking turns playing with, was it Josh Welton? or someone else, you could tell he wasn't as precise or as smooth on the instrument as someone who had devoted all their time to it. He was still way better than he had to be, he was still awesome on the keys, he was more importantly a creative force on the instrument which is probably his biggest contribution to music, he was a pioneer in tinkering with the things when they were still primitive and was creating sounds that had everyone copying him (or trying to) in the 80's.

databank said:

Musician9 said:

typical P thread, half the responses are not related to the subject at hand then they steer the convo off into defensive territory, example here, well, P had a great voice, what the hell are you people on? The topic is clear so let the opinions flow, but no, the apostles of P step forward, angry that others don't fawn over every note and fart of their music lord, to change the subject to their liking. And the post about P and classical guitarists? R U serious? Sadly, yes, that person was serious and believes there is something remotely classical in Purple Rain, I once thought I'd find rational discussions about music, equipment and recording techniques on here, but alas...

I sort of agree with you but not on opinions flowing. The last thing we need on a thread like this is opinions. What we need is knowledge.

.

The only thing that bothers me about those threads is that the only people who should reply are people who know what they're talking about. Same with that recent thread about musically challenging things in P's music. I really wish someone who plays the piano or truly understands what piano playing involves could actually explain to me why Prince was good, or not that good, or better than the average but not as good as Diana Krall or Keith Jarrett, and so on. Same with that other thread, I really wish people with solid knowledge of music theory could explain to me why such or such song is interesting, like someone actually did by describing the chord changes in Take Me With U in details. But that was only one usueful contribution in the whole thread!

.

But we usually end-up with a lot of people giving their opinion, without providing anything relevant to support it because they don't have the knowledge. And after 5 to 10 pages of people saying nothing and not answering the OP's question, the thread is left to die and quickly forgotten

.

IDK, we can also have a thread about quantum physics and have every office worker, literature teacher, lawyer, plumber and hairdresser here giving their opinion on quantum physics. People sure have opinions. But we still won't have learned a thing about quantum physics in the end...

A couple months ago, I read the reviews written about his Piano and Microphone tour (all written before he died). One of the critics stated that Prince played similarly to Ray Charles at times and they complimented his playing. Recently I was reading about those two chefs who worked for Prince before he died. the man stated that their kitchen was close enough to hear Prince practicing and preparing. They said he listened to a lot of Ray Charles and would practice measures over and over again. Interesting.

PeteSilas said:

I don't think you have to play an instrument necessarily to recognize talent anymore than you have to be a gymnast to realize what they do is very difficult. I'm no guitarist but I can listen to some hendrix and to me it sounds like that damned thing is directly fused to his soul in a way no else had it. As a pianist, depends on genre, classical music is extremely demanding as far as technique, repertoire, probably more than any other genre. very perfectionistic but also very uncreative for most of the top people, they are supposed to play it exactly how they are supposed to play it and no different, of course there will always be different styles of play because everyone is different but you aren't supposed to be changed notes and shit. Jazz is way more open, way more harmonically diverse and they have still have something that classical music left behind a while ago; improvisation. also, i a few mistakes here and there won't have anyone calling you overrated. I told my jazz teacher that i heard oscar peterson making a lot of mistakes and he said "a ton of them" as if it meant nothing in jazz. In classical, the snobs would never have that but Oscar is arguably the greatest jazz pianist ever. Now, Prince, harmonically, of course he wasn't doing anything as advanced as the most advanced jazz players, technically, he wasn't doing things or playing as fast, as fluid or as powerful as i've heard the best classical pianists (then again, i've rarely even heard prince play a real piano, most of them were keyboards which don't translate the same as pianos) even watching the clip on youtube of prince taking turns playing with, was it Josh Welton? or someone else, you could tell he wasn't as precise or as smooth on the instrument as someone who had devoted all their time to it. He was still way better than he had to be, he was still awesome on the keys, he was more importantly a creative force on the instrument which is probably his biggest contribution to music, he was a pioneer in tinkering with the things when they were still primitive and was creating sounds that had everyone copying him (or trying to) in the 80's.

databank said:

I sort of agree with you but not on opinions flowing. The last thing we need on a thread like this is opinions. What we need is knowledge.

.

The only thing that bothers me about those threads is that the only people who should reply are people who know what they're talking about. Same with that recent thread about musically challenging things in P's music. I really wish someone who plays the piano or truly understands what piano playing involves could actually explain to me why Prince was good, or not that good, or better than the average but not as good as Diana Krall or Keith Jarrett, and so on. Same with that other thread, I really wish people with solid knowledge of music theory could explain to me why such or such song is interesting, like someone actually did by describing the chord changes in Take Me With U in details. But that was only one usueful contribution in the whole thread!

.

But we usually end-up with a lot of people giving their opinion, without providing anything relevant to support it because they don't have the knowledge. And after 5 to 10 pages of people saying nothing and not answering the OP's question, the thread is left to die and quickly forgotten

.

IDK, we can also have a thread about quantum physics and have every office worker, literature teacher, lawyer, plumber and hairdresser here giving their opinion on quantum physics. People sure have opinions. But we still won't have learned a thing about quantum physics in the end...

he was a huge uncle ray fan, his performance in the One night alone dvd of strange relationship illustrates some of this best. Even Ray Charles though, has admitted that he wasn't "the best" on arsenio he said there were some guys that could really play but "they couldn't sell 10,000 albums" ray was smart enough to diversify and NOT SPECIALIZE which freed him up to sing, produce, lead and be a businessman.

purplerabbithole said:

A couple months ago, I read the reviews written about his Piano and Microphone tour (all written before he died). One of the critics stated that Prince played similarly to Ray Charles at times and they complimented his playing. Recently I was reading about those two chefs who worked for Prince before he died. the man stated that their kitchen was close enough to hear Prince practicing and preparing. They said he listened to a lot of Ray Charles and would practice measures over and over again. Interesting.

PeteSilas said:

I don't think you have to play an instrument necessarily to recognize talent anymore than you have to be a gymnast to realize what they do is very difficult. I'm no guitarist but I can listen to some hendrix and to me it sounds like that damned thing is directly fused to his soul in a way no else had it. As a pianist, depends on genre, classical music is extremely demanding as far as technique, repertoire, probably more than any other genre. very perfectionistic but also very uncreative for most of the top people, they are supposed to play it exactly how they are supposed to play it and no different, of course there will always be different styles of play because everyone is different but you aren't supposed to be changed notes and shit. Jazz is way more open, way more harmonically diverse and they have still have something that classical music left behind a while ago; improvisation. also, i a few mistakes here and there won't have anyone calling you overrated. I told my jazz teacher that i heard oscar peterson making a lot of mistakes and he said "a ton of them" as if it meant nothing in jazz. In classical, the snobs would never have that but Oscar is arguably the greatest jazz pianist ever. Now, Prince, harmonically, of course he wasn't doing anything as advanced as the most advanced jazz players, technically, he wasn't doing things or playing as fast, as fluid or as powerful as i've heard the best classical pianists (then again, i've rarely even heard prince play a real piano, most of them were keyboards which don't translate the same as pianos) even watching the clip on youtube of prince taking turns playing with, was it Josh Welton? or someone else, you could tell he wasn't as precise or as smooth on the instrument as someone who had devoted all their time to it. He was still way better than he had to be, he was still awesome on the keys, he was more importantly a creative force on the instrument which is probably his biggest contribution to music, he was a pioneer in tinkering with the things when they were still primitive and was creating sounds that had everyone copying him (or trying to) in the 80's.

But he was no slouch right?

PeteSilas said:

he was a huge uncle ray fan, his performance in the One night alone dvd of strange relationship illustrates some of this best. Even Ray Charles though, has admitted that he wasn't "the best" on arsenio he said there were some guys that could really play but "they couldn't sell 10,000 albums" ray was smart enough to diversify and NOT SPECIALIZE which freed him up to sing, produce, lead and be a businessman.

purplerabbithole said:

A couple months ago, I read the reviews written about his Piano and Microphone tour (all written before he died). One of the critics stated that Prince played similarly to Ray Charles at times and they complimented his playing. Recently I was reading about those two chefs who worked for Prince before he died. the man stated that their kitchen was close enough to hear Prince practicing and preparing. They said he listened to a lot of Ray Charles and would practice measures over and over again. Interesting.

purplerabbithole said:

But he was no slouch right?

PeteSilas said:

he was a huge uncle ray fan, his performance in the One night alone dvd of strange relationship illustrates some of this best. Even Ray Charles though, has admitted that he wasn't "the best" on arsenio he said there were some guys that could really play but "they couldn't sell 10,000 albums" ray was smart enough to diversify and NOT SPECIALIZE which freed him up to sing, produce, lead and be a businessman.

of course not, he was great but he knew he wasn't "the best" i know a guy in seattle, still alive who i consider better. He was a contemporary of Ray's, i never asked him, but he had to have known ray, he was in the same circles at the same time, his name is Overton Berry, my favorite pianist, i don't think that man is rich, that's what happens when you specialize.

I imagine if Prince specialized he could have been as good technically as anyone. But maybe he wouldn't have been as interesting in whole scheme of things. Same thing for Ray.

PeteSilas said:

purplerabbithole said:

But he was no slouch right?

of course not, he was great but he knew he wasn't "the best" i know a guy in seattle, still alive who i consider better. He was a contemporary of Ray's, i never asked him, but he had to have known ray, he was in the same circles at the same time, his name is Overton Berry, my favorite pianist, i don't think that man is rich, that's what happens when you specialize.

purplerabbithole said:

I imagine if Prince specialized he could have been as good technically as anyone. But maybe he wouldn't have been as interesting in whole scheme of things. Same thing for Ray.

PeteSilas said:

of course not, he was great but he knew he wasn't "the best" i know a guy in seattle, still alive who i consider better. He was a contemporary of Ray's, i never asked him, but he had to have known ray, he was in the same circles at the same time, his name is Overton Berry, my favorite pianist, i don't think that man is rich, that's what happens when you specialize.

that's what i've been saying to everyone. You only have so much time, talent and hardwork to give. ray was very smart. I've read about him listening to oscar peterson and lamenting the fact that he couldn't devote more time to the piano. Same with nat cole, one of the stone greatest jazz pianists who Oscar Peterson mournfully stated that his Pop career took him away from. It's that simple really, everyone only has so much time and energy in a day. The fact is, pop music is directed at the people who don't want or need to know much about music but want to hear something they'll like, they could care less about technique or greatness and they will spend for what they want. Barry Gordy said he learned that lesson when he tried to open a record store not selling pop records before he had motown, the store tanked but he had enough requests from customers to know that there was demand for pop and the results of that are history.

thx pete, as always for offering a well rounding knowledgeable perspective that the musician

and layperson can relate too. You offer many perpectives and ways for each type of learner to

grasp the idea you are trying to convey. i sense that this would make you a great teacher if you aren't already.

purplefam99 said:

thx pete, as always for offering a well rounding knowledgeable perspective that the musician

and layperson can relate too. You offer many perpectives and ways for each type of learner to

grasp the idea you are trying to convey. i sense that this would make you a great teacher if you aren't already.

anytime, thank you, no, not a teacher.

PeteSilas said:

purplefam99 said:

thx pete, as always for offering a well rounding knowledgeable perspective that the musician

and layperson can relate too. You offer many perpectives and ways for each type of learner to

grasp the idea you are trying to convey. i sense that this would make you a great teacher if you aren't already.

anytime, thank you, no, not a teacher.

not even a music teacher???

purplefam99 said:

PeteSilas said:

anytime, thank you, no, not a teacher.

not even a music teacher???

no, never seriously considered it, i had too many teachers who failed me and didn't want to do that to anyone else.

PeteSilas said:

purplefam99 said:

not even a music teacher???

no, never seriously considered it, i had too many teachers who failed me and didn't want to do that to anyone else.

yep the good ones are few and far between.

I positively adore the arrogance and music snoberry that shows itself out whenever a thread like this comes up. Motherfuckers are all "obviously you know NOTHING about music or piano playing and are listening to the WRONG shit if you've never heard of Teddy Thunderkeys, Max Ivory, Eddie Eighty Eight or Iassic Grand, you buncha' plebes. EVERYBODY knows those guys. Prince was pure pop, you pussies. Get yo head out the sand."

"Now, here's a list of shit I like showing off my superior music knowledge. Everyone pay attention and bask in my knowledge."

herb4 said:

I positively adore the arrogance and music snoberry that shows itself out whenever a thread like this comes up. Motherfuckers are all "obviously you know NOTHING about music or piano playing and are listening to the WRONG shit if you've never heard of Teddy Thunderkeys, Max Ivory, Eddie Eighty Eight or Iassic Grand, you buncha' plebes. EVERYBODY knows those guys. Prince was pure pop, you pussies. Get yo head out the sand."

"Now, here's a list of shit I like showing off my superior music knowledge. Everyone pay attention and bask in my knowledge."

.

Hey, someone's gotta do it.

soladeo1 said:

Nice feel for the instrument and definitely had his own recognizable style but wasn't a very technical player. He could have used a few lessons from Freddie Mercury.

Do you actually play the piano?

Leslita said:

soladeo1 said:

Nice feel for the instrument and definitely had his own recognizable style but wasn't a very technical player. He could have used a few lessons from Freddie Mercury.

Do you actually play the piano?

.

Do you consider that a prerequisite for someone assessing someone's piano skills?