The 'Tour Press Release' of February 17 for One Nite Alone says 'Music's peerless leader Prince will set out on a national Spring tour giving audiences a show like they've never seen before'.

My personal thoughts are that Prince is peerless as far as popular music is concerned. I don't mean any disrespect to Prince's music though, but when you look at other forms of music such as Jazz and Classical, it's far fetched to say he is peerless.

Having said that, I feel that at some stage Prince will "transcend his own musical genius". I think it will take a mind shift to achieve this though. By that I mean that because his music has been so focussed toward the popular music market his composition/writing are limited by the popular form/thinking. In other words the basic musical structure of a pop song.

It was actually the song One Nite Alone that got me thinking about this. This is not popular music. I don't mean it can't be popular, it was immediately one of my favorites, I just mean it doesn't follow the popular mind set and basic form.

TRC and One Nite Alone are a new direction for Prince's music and really set him apart from the mundane popular musicians. What do you think though about Prince being music's peerless leader?

I think "peerless leader" is a phrase written by a PR person who thought it sounded clever.

Toccata...I really have nothing to add to your post. I argee. LIL MAN is somewhat restricted in terms of his musicianship because of the pop song structure. This is why I think jazz would be a good step for him. Because then, he would have "room" to just stretch out and improvise on his instrument(s). There's a lot of room within the jazz song structure for P to just express his true creativity on his primary instrument...the guitar.

Brother 9/15 aka CR3

Brother915 said:

You talkin' 'bout me? Who you callin' restricted?

Brother 9/15 I agree that Jazz techniques are a good thing for his music. It's interesting that the Jazz he has incorporated up to this point mainly uses instruments from his domain rather than the traditional Jazz instruments. I know plenty of others have done this but he does it really well. Even a lot of heavy metal guitarists use Jazz techniques for their guitar solos but in my opinion Prince does it very well.

I'd also like to hear some larger works from Prince. I mean the sort of works that take a melody, develop it, improvise, introduce other melodies, develop, improvise, etc.

sexi said:

I'm sure you are most likely right sexi. It's kinda like the modern day Mozart comment of the 80's, although that probably wasn't written by one of Prince's PR people.

The "peerless leader" thing interested me though because I think he has the talent to be at the pinnacle, but not when he is restricted by popular forms/thinking. I'm just interested to see what other people think about this.

Press releases are grist for the hype mill. It's no different than with many other recording artists or actors making movies for a living. They're trying to get people to go to the shows.

When Prince is hungry he transcends the musical boundaries of pop music, though he hasn't attempted to create a jazz or classical album.

What some don't realize is that every genre has its limits, even jazz and classical. But if you're an instrumentalist you won't find an American musical form that is more free than jazz.

I think when it comes to a live show (when he's not doing a silly medly), the majority of Prince's music is more expansive than what we generally think of as pop music, which is why it's always been sort of a misnomer to label him a "pop star" per se. Sure, he's made some pop music, and sold a lot of records to the pop audience. But digging deeper into his albums you'll find that he's an album artist who goes deeper than that too, because a lot of his music is much more challenging and inventive than the vast majority of pop performers.

I'd be more interested in Prince's attempt at jazz than an attempt at classical. But not something he might just toss off, something he put a good effort into. For years now it's easy to find jazz, classical, and even gospel tinges in his music.