Purple Rain – Prince on Improvisation, Ingenuity and Innovation

The name Prince is synonymous with innovation in music. From classy pop classics such as ‘Purple Rain’, ‘Diamonds and Pearls’ and ‘U Got The Look’ through to high class jazz, soul and funk, working with artists such as Miles Davis, Chaka Khan, and George Clinton. Prince performs at this weekend’s Hop Farm festival in Kent and I’m delighted to have a ticket for the occasion. Check this performance of Superstition out with Stevie Wonder out to see what you will be missing if you are not there.

Unlike many performers in rock’s monarchy, a Prince live performance is often different every night. This is because Prince operates from a menu of 300 songs, which the band may be called upon to play at any time, whereas many other artists prefer to perfect and then repeat their set night after night. Admittedly, this is difficult for some of his audience to take but speaks of artistic integrity and a desire to constantly develop. I was discussing how Prince achieves such amazing levels of nimbleness and ingenuity with my colleague John Howitt, a professional musician who has performed for Celine Dion, Anastasia and Shirley Bassey to name but a few. We came to a set of conclusions, with parallel lessons for businesses that are interested in being fast, nimble and continuously innovative. Here are a couple:

• To reach mastery in improvisation paradoxically requires intensive detailed preparation. What looks like a seamless performance is the result of many hours of preparation and Prince is meticulous in this respect. In business this has been referred to ‘the 10,000 hours effect’ by Tom Peters and, more recently, Malcolm Gladwell. The idea of prepared spontaneity contradicts what some so-called creativity and innovation gurus say on the subject, yet we constantly see parallels across many industries. Sloppy creativity produces sloppy results in many businesses.

• Prince is also a master of fusing musical genres and influences outside his core style to innovate. This enables him to still exert a major influence on artists of the 21st Century, such as Lady Gaga, Beyonce and many others. In business, the ability to cross mental boundaries is the parallel skill set, as exemplified by companies such as 3M and Google.

I explore more of Prince’s personal qualities and the relationship with becoming an agile, ingenious and innovative company within the book “Sex, Leadership and Rock‘n’Roll” and the new one “The Music of Business“, acclaimed by Harvey Goldsmith.

I’m delighted to say that I managed to get a copy of the book to Prince at his last series of O2 concerts and have been told that he enjoyed it. Praise indeed! John Howitt draws a distinction between Prince’s level of risk taking on stage versus his experience of working with artists such as Celine Dion, who aims for a perfect, polished performance which can be reproduced night after night. Both approaches are valid and rest on thorough preparation if you want to reach out for excellence. An object lesson for all – if you want to be a star, know that perspiration is much more important than inspiration. Here’s a little bit of improvisation from an impromptu event in Italy:

We will be exploring aspects of Prince’s approach to improvisation, innovation and reinvention at the 7th International HR summit event in Athens, Greece on October 20th following on from Dave Ulrich. For now, its the Hop Farm for me to witness his purple majesty in action on 03 July.

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About the Blogger:  Peter Cook leads The Academy of Rock – Keynote events with a difference and Human Dynamics – Business and organisation development, training and coaching.  Contact via peter@humdyn.co.uk