Prince in concert in Paris on 30 June 2011. – BERTRAND GUAY / AFP
    • 22/04/2016 at 20:32
    • updated

for years, Prince lived away from the media and the Internet, where his music is also difficult to find. Yet he continued to work passionately to get a two albums a year, and to have loyal fans. Since the announcement of his death at age 57, the world celebrates the kid Minneapolis
 movie actor,
 the fashion icon, the pop legend. But how best to present Prince to his children, to new generations? 20 Minutes asked Frédéric Goaty, editor Jazz Magazine and author of Prince, The Dictionary (Le Castor Astral).

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“Since yesterday, people are looking to listen to his songs and see his videos on the Internet, but they find nothing. Even in death, Prince continues to do what he wants. His music, you have to pay. This is why music stores are mobbed in the United States, the 15/25 years buy its vinyls. For him, music has always been an artistic and commercial value had to be maintained. He had the same spirit as the artists of 60-70 years as Stevie Wonder and Miles Davis: we must work hard to improve, but there is no shame in making money, to be successful <. /> p>

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Prince still has an incredible talent, and a radical approach. At the time of the album Dirty Mind in 1980, it is the small black, African-American who does nothing like the others. The whites are fans of Earth, Wind & amp; Fire and their satin pants, they do not understand that this kid does with his mix of soul, jazz and funk, and with his tight pants without underwear underneath. His manager told him one day that he also would have to put underpants, then the next day he showed up on stage in underwear, just slip. “

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“Before Purple Rain Prince already has success, but the States STATES, especially from the black community. He tries many things, playing on his sexual ambiguity, provokes with his texts. This album allows him to do what is called a “cross-over”, he now speaks to everyone, every community. Whether on the shape with this pocket where it sports a look at Jimi Hendrix, or on the bottom with her at the crossroads of rock, funk and Latin music. It is also the first to introduce synthesizers instead of brass, to use new technologies samplers, drum machines, etc. With the key 20 million records sold, and an immeasurable influence on hip-hop and R’n’B singers. “

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“In 1995, the beginnings of the Internet, he said that with” that thing “, the houses of discs were badly blocked. Drummer told me the story. In 2000, he is the first, David Bowie, to create its own site, NPG Music Club, to sell his music. It is unimaginable today, but he did pay a subscription of $ 100 per year for an hour of original music per month. Four years later, it still disrupts the system and offers, or rather includes his album Musicology with the price of the room for his tour. Result: it is within the top 5 of the charts and made 100 million profit. a marketing genius. “

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“Each concert was unique, he could stop in the middle, or propose an after-show at night. I remember one Bataclan in 1995, where he was in conflict with Warner and had given the name Prince the benefit of Love Symbol. He refused to play his old songs and proposed that new. We did not know them, but we were all in communion. During his Zenith in Paris in 2002, it was even possible for fans to attend rehearsals and the concert and finally an after-show at the Bataclan, until 5 am. Never seen. “

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