Prince Dead at 57

The music world has lost a famous performer, Prince Rogers Nelson. According to a statement by his publicist, Yvette Noel-Schure, Prince died at his Paisley Park residence on the morning of Thursday, 21 April 2016. Many press and media stations have announced the death and that the cause is not known but investigations are being done.
Reporting to the Associated Press, Sheriff Jim Oslon from the Carver County Sheriff’s Office, explained how sheriffs deputies reported to Paisley Park Studios located in Chanhassen at 9:43 am, in response to an emergency call made at 9.33 am. On arrival, medical personnel and the deputies found an adult male in the elevator. As he was not responding, they tried to give him first aid and lifesaving Cardiac Pulmonary Resuscitation (CPR), but he they were unable to revive him and was pronounced dead at 10:07 am.

A week before Prince died, he had performed at Moline, Illinois and later left in his private plane for his Minneapolis home, but had to make an emergency landing to seek medical attention. He was treated for flu and dehydration, then he was discharged from hospital to continue with his flight and to go and recuperate at home. The TMZ reported that Prince had to cancel some of his early April appointments, such as the ‘Piano and a Microphone’ tour.

Ever since his debut album in 1978, Prince became an icon of pop, funk, R&B, rock, soul and all sorts of music. He started by writing, producing and performing his own music until when he built his own music empire at his Minneapolis home. He won many Grammy awards. The peak of his career saw Prince engaging in acting and in 1984, he starred in the blockbuster Purple Rain album and won various trophies as a director and writer of screenplays for other plays. In the nineties, Prince engaged in movies, such as “Graffiti Bridge” which featured a story of Prince’s album, but did not do very well commercially. He decided to go back to music in 1991 and was contracted by Warner and Brothers, until 1996, when he started distributing 3-CD sets under EMI. In 2000, he experimented with different ideas, which did not work well for him. He returned to pop music in 2004 and continued as the best male performer in various music categories.

With the emergence of YouTube, Prince became an advocate speaking against piracy.He would remove his music from the market if he thought that it was being pirated. He later went back to recording and releasing records. He preferred a private life and rarely conducted interviews.
At a private concert in New York in March this year, Prince announced to the his audience, that he had started working on his memoirs, which would begin with his first memory until the Super Bowl. The memoir book would tentatively be entitled, “The Beautiful Ones.”
Prince was last seen in public attending in a party at Paisley Park, with his newly acquired purple guitar. According to Sharyn Jackson, a Star Tribune Staff writer, Prince talked about rumors of his ill health, then told the crowd to give it a few days before wasting any prayers.