On Thursday April 21, the world lost a musical genius and one of the most prevalent icons of the century. Indeed, these past months have not been kind to mega-stars: Alan Rickman and David Bowie are among the beloved artists who have passed away recently, leaving the world to mourn their loss. This Thursday, yet another star joined the ranks at the age of 57: Prince, of "Purple Rain" (among many other well known pieces of music). The details are currently scant; the following information is what was known at the time of writing this article (Friday, April 22).
His death was confirmed by his publicist, but there have been no leads on the cause as of yet. He seems to have died mysteriously, following his plane's emergency landing last week so that he could be rushed to the hospital to receive flu treatment. Prince's body was found unresponsive in his home, and though first responders attempted CPR, he was pronounced dead at 10:57. Today (April 22), doctors performed an autopsy on Prince's body from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Full reports, including toxicology, is expected to take weeks, according to a released statement.
Without answers, we are left to mourn the legacy of someone brimming with energy, creativity, and life. 1,000 words is nowhere near enough to sum up Prince's flair and ambition. Tributes to him have begun pouring out in the form of music, tweets, articles and more. Prince defied categories across musical genres and even in terms of gender. He was a style icon as well as one for music, and is looked back upon as the head of the then-burgeoning gender fluidity movement in fashion and society. He is quoted as famously saying, "I'm not a woman, I'm not a man, I'm something you will never understand." Alone, the quote sounds flippant; but in context of his androgynous fashion and experimental videos, it makes perfect sense. No matter how one looks back on his evolving presentation, he celebrated letting out our inner weird.
Prince was passionate about music; this goes without saying. He could not have revolutionized an entire industry without the passion and ambition that he had pouring out of him. He had strong words about genres, his songwriting, his sources of inspiration, even the music industry itself. He was critical and then acted out the change he wanted to see happen. "There's no excitement or mystery," he said of modern pop music; well, he completely revamped the idea of pop and gave excitement and mystery galore. When he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, he discussed his focus on freedom. "When I first started out in the music industry, I was most concerned with freedom. Freedom to produce, freedom to play all the instruments on my records, freedom to say anything I wanted to."
Anyone even remotely familiar with Prince knows that he stuck to his concept of freedom. His music, his image, his legacy were all his own. The world mourns the loss of a true symbol of expression, of great music, of freedom.
(Considering the recent date of Prince's death, a couple days is nowhere near enough time to properly eulogize such a figure. Stay tuned for a full musician profile of Prince, in which I research and examine his music and rise to fame throughout his life).
