- Arrived an hour late to the 2007 Golden Globe Awards due to traffic and missed accepting the Golden Globe for Best Song for Happy Feet (2006). Justin Timberlake accepted the award for him, after an awkward silence waiting for him to come on stage. He did so in an amusing fashion by crouching down to a shorter height and raising his voice to accept the award for Prince. Hugh Grant later announced that he had finally arrived after being stuck in gridlock traffic, and gave him an opportunity to stand and receive applause for his win.
- On 7/7/07 he thrilled his hometown fans by performing three shows over 12 hours, only stopping when police shut him down. The Minneapolis native first performed at a department store to promote his new cologne, cramming nine songs into a 45-minute set. He then played that night at the Target Center arena. He capped the night with a return to First Avenue, the club he made famous in Purple Rain (1984). Minnesota's governor and the Minneapolis mayor issued proclamations honoring him, and fans flew in from all over the country to see the performer. After the Target Center, he waited until nearly 2:45 a.m. before starting the First Avenue show, the first time he had played at the club since 1987. The city lets music play until 4 a.m. He was 15 songs and 70 minutes into a 24-song set when he announced from the stage: "The authorities say we gotta go. We always listen to the authorities. I promise I'll be back".
- On 10/16/96 his son, with Mayte Garcia, was born with the rare skull disease Pfeiffer's syndrome and unable to breathe without a ventilator. The child was taken off life support on 23 October and died.
- He was one of the very few musicians who wrote, produced and composed all of their music themselves. On most of his albums, he played all the instruments himself, except for brass instruments, though he did have a backing band for concerts. His songwriting skills provided hits for others such as Chaka Khan, Sinéad O'Connor and Jordan Knight.
- He was diagnosed with epilepsy as a child, and had seizures through his early childhood. However, it wasn't until 2009, in an interview with PBS' Tavis Smiley, that he openly talked about this, one of very few celebrities to go public about their experience as someone living with epilepsy. He also credited epilepsy with motivating him to become a performer.
- Played the song "1999" at his New Year's Eve party in 1999, which was televised as Rave un2 the Year 2000 (2000), then announced he was retiring the song. In true fashion he did a U-turn and re-instated this song in full in 2007, last performing it in 2015.
- In May 2000 he dropped the symbol O(+> he adopted as a name. He had used the symbol because he considered his record contract with Warner Bros. Records oppressive;l the contract expired in 2000.
- During the filming of Purple Rain (1984), he was told one day by director Albert Magnoli that the film needed a montage song that dealt heavily on emotions. Prince responded with two songs the very next morning, written, produced and recorded. One of the songs was the smash hit "When Doves Cry".
- His 1984 album "Purple Rain" sold 13 million copies in the US.
- One of the most acclaimed musicians of his generation, he was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in March 2004. He was also voted the 28th greatest Rock & Roll Artist of all time by "Rolling Stone" magazine. He was inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame for his outstanding contribution to British music and integral part of British music culture in November 2006. He was ranked #18 on VH1's 100 Greatest Artists of Rock & Roll and #5 on VH1's 100 Sexiest Artists.
- In November 2005 he was told by his doctors that he would need a hip replacement following years of energetic dancing on stage.
- He was to duet with Michael Jackson on his album "Bad", but could not decide on the words to the song. He didn't like the first lyric, "Your butt is mine".
- The symbol to which he changed his name (which is best rendered as either O{+> or O(+> in normal ASCII characters) originated in and was borrowed by him from ancient Europe.
- Was one of very few artists who denied 'Weird Al' Yankovic permission to parody any of his songs. After years of asking, ''Weird Al" obtained video parody permission and the video for UHF (1989) includes a sequence that spoofs the bathtub intro for video of "When Doves Cry".
- Died on 4/21/16, 67 days after the death of his longtime protege and former girlfriend, Denise Katherine Matthews, better known as Vanity. She died on 2/15/16, 14 years to the day after his mother, Mattie Della Baker (Mattie Shaw) also known as Mattie Nelson.
- His home, Paisley Park, is set to become a public monument like Graceland became to Elvis Presley.
- His 2006 tour made him the most lucrative live performer of the year. His 69-city, 96-show tour took $87.4 million (£45.5 million), beating Céline Dion's Las Vegas residency, which came in second, taking $80.4 million (£41.8 million).
- He sold 100 million albums worldwide during his lifetime.
- In his An Evening with Kevin Smith (2002) film, director Kevin Smith says that he learned during shooting of a documentary for Prince that he has made about 50 fully produced music videos for songs that were never released in any kind of form.
- Known for his colorful outfits and explicitly flaunting and expressing his strong sexuality during his performances in his early days, despite being a devout Christian. This all changed in 2001 on becoming a Jehovah's Witness; due to his religious beliefs the sexy lyrics and tight/skimpy clothing were dropped, He also insisted that no one swear around him.
- He performed at the Super Bowl XLI halftime show in Miami, FL, to a worldwide television audience of 140 million viewers on2/4/07.
- On 5/10/10 he merited a place in "Time" magazine's "The 100 Most Influential People in the World ("Artists" category)" with an homage penned by Usher.
- Shared a strong interest in silent-screen star Clara Bow with friend and former girlfriend Sherilyn Fenn.
- During high school he was in a band called "Champagne" with his cousin Charles "Chazz" Smith and friends Morris Day and friend Andre Cymone then called Andre Anderson, Andre's sister Linda Anderson, William Doughty and Terry Jackson.
- Was known as "Gazoo" in school because of his huge Afro and small body. Gazoo was the flying space guy in The Flintstones (1960) cartoon series with the giant head covered by a space helmet.
- A very short man, he often had to wear large shoes on stage so he wasn't dwarfed by some female singers.
- He performed a composition written by his father, John L. Nelson, in the music of Purple Rain (1984); called "Father's Song" the main melody was also part of a song from the Purple Rain (1984) soundtrack, called "Computer Blue".
- Reportedly has enough unreleased music in his Vault at Paisley Park to fill albums for the next century, but since he has no will it is unknown if any of it will ever be made public.
- The symbol he used as his name was also the name of his last Warner Bros. album as Prince, which was released just a few months before his name change. He recorded as Prince since then on his independently distributed, self-released albums and those licensed to Arista/BMG Records and Columbia/SME Records.
- Started the careers of Vanity and Carmen Electra, among others.
- Was the winner of the British Phonographic Industry Awards for International Act and Soundtrack for "Purple Rain" in 1985. He was also the winner of the Brit Award for International Solo Artist in two consecutive years, 1992 and 1993.
- Elton John and BBC arts editor Will Gompertz both described him upon his death as the best live performer they had ever seen.
- Was working on his memoirs with his brother when he passed away.
- Son of jazz pianist John L. Nelson.
- He joined Sylvester Stallone, Roberto Benigni, Kevin Costner, William Shatner and Tom Green as being the only actors to direct themselves in performances that would win them a Razzie Award for Worst Actor.
- In the late 1990s he requested to be referred to as simply The Artist, since his initial intention when he changed his name to O(+> was to not be referred to as Prince. Unfortunately, that was not going too well, considering everyone was calling him the Artist Formerly Known as Prince because the symbol has no pronunciation.
- Universal Music Group has been granted permission to release the post-1995 music in his "Vault" which will begin streaming on the night of the Grammys in 2017.
- Provided the music for Girl 6 (1996) as Prince. It was the only time he referred to himself as Prince from 1993 to 2000.
- In Fargo (1996), a drive-by witness to a murder is credited as O(+>, a direct reference to Prince's stage name at the time. This is actually a reference to the fact that both he and directors Joel Coen and Ethan Coen are from Minnesota.
- On 6/7/93 he changed his stage name to O(+>.
- Founder of Paisley Park Records.
- On 5/19/17 a Minnesota judge ruled that his six siblings are the heirs to his estate.
- He never allowed his voice to be recorded while being interviewed. The interviewer could only make notes of what he was saying.
- Lived with English singer Anna Florence from when she was 17. He wrote the songs "Coat of Pink Cashmere" (a gift he gave her), 'Lemon Crush" and 'Vicky Waiting" for her.
- Wrote a song for his friend, Jackie Swanson, entitled "Palomino Pleasure Ride".
- His estate is estimated to be worth as much as $300 million.
- Mentioned in Eminem's song, "Without Me".
- Dwyane Wade was his favorite basketball player but Oklahoma City Thunder was his favorite basketball team.
- Mentioned in the song, "Shoop", by Salt-N-Pepa.
- Covers of two of his songs were so successful they actually surpassed the sales of the originals: The Art of Noise feat. Tom Jones: Kiss (1988) and Sinéad O'Connor: Nothing Compares 2 U (1990).
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