The musician Stevie Wonder said brought every genre together: “If he wanted to”
There is nothing inherently wrong with sticking to your specialities – a fact that decades worth of Mastermind has demonstrated – but the mark of a truly generational artist has always been a willingness to step outside the comfort zone of speciality, as in the case of Stevie Wonder.
Spending his teen years at the heart of America’s most important record label, Motown, Wonder’s talents were immediately obvious, but they weren’t always utilised to their full extent. Such was the production-line nature of Berry Gordy’s label that the young performer wasn’t afforded much in the way of creative freedom. Nevertheless, his desire for artistic diversity and experimentation was building all the while.
Then, when his 1971 contract re-negotiation meant he had more creative freedom and autonomy than anybody else at the label, Wonder’s output expectedly sprawled off into countless different directions. From embracing the new technologies of synthesisers and programming to blending the realms of spiritual psychedelia with infectious funk, the pianist quickly boasted one of the most expansive, genre-defying outputs ever seen in the American musical landscape.
Along the way, of course, Wonder’s output helped to inspire the next generation of revolutionary songwriters, including, among them, Prince. Beginning his own musical journey in the mid-1970s, when Wonder was reaching his creative peak with LPs like Fulfillingness’ First Finale and Songs in the Key of Life, Prince’s output borrowed from the same handbook, consistently reinventing itself and refusing to be tied down to one specific sound or genre for overly long.
Inevitably, therefore, Wonder soon became an ardent devotee of the Minneapolis songwriter, so much so that the pair ended up collaborating on more than a few occasions. In fact, Prince provided backing vocals for Wonder’s 2005 track ‘So What the Fuss’, which – to date – was the Motown star’s last entry into the US pop charts.
Speaking on the palpable artistic power of Prince, Wonder once told CNN, “He brought all the various cultures together, and he could play classical music if he wanted to, he could play jazz if he wanted to, he could play country if he wanted to, he played rock, he played blues, he played pop. You know, everything.” Adding, “He was just a great musician.”
For the casual listener, it is easy to reduce Prince’s extensive output to his prevailing hits – the likes of ‘Purple Rain’, ‘1999’, or ‘Feel For You’, for instance – but, as Wonder attests to, the songwriter’s sonic repertoire was far greater than virtually any of his contemporaries.
Capable of taking on virtually any genre under the sun, and with a plethora of instrumental talents tirelessly honed over decades, he was a true and complete artist, and one whom Stevie Wonder could not help but respect.
There is no wonder, then, that out of the countless legendary figures Stevie Wonder has encountered or collaborated with over his many years on the upper echelon of songwriting, Prince has always and will always stand out as one of the most gifted performers of his generation.
