Bland organized the upcoming concert partly because there never was a big event last year to celebrate the boxed set reissue of Prince's 1991 album "Diamonds and Pearls." So he's enlisted various NPG alums including Tommy Barbarella, Levi Seacer Jr. and Mike Scott and such locals as the Steeles, Chastity Brown, Jay Bee and Ashley Commodore to salute the Purple One.

At rehearsal last week, Brown tore through a deeply soulful treatment of "When U Were Mine" that sounded nothing like Prince's new wave original version or Cyndi Lauper's spunky cover.

"Wow!" Bland declared, thrilled at Brown's first run-through.

Without pausing, she then poured her heart into two more Prince songs as if she were playing to a packed arena, not just three other musicians.

Afterward, as Brown was packing up her guitar and electric keyboard, she shook her head in disbelief. "This is the highlight of my life," she announced. "I would not try to copy him [Prince]. He'd be: 'Boring.'"

The concert — billed as 2Gether: Celebrating the Music & Life of Prince — is taking place on the eve of the anniversary of Prince's passing in 2016.

"It can be strange and painful to play Prince's music," Bland admitted. "It's a strange sort of self-inflicted duty to continue forward. I feel a responsibility now that I never felt before."

We asked some of the concert participants — dancer-turned-rapper Tony Mosley, Thompson and Bland — to share some thoughts about the Paisley One.

Q: What years did you work with Prince?

Bland: Full time from 1989 through 1996. Starting probably in '98 or '99, we sort of patched things up and I went in a role to record when he needed me. It's 2:30 in the morning. Of course, I'm available. I live 10 or 15 minutes from Paisley. From the mid-'00s, Sonny and I recorded quite a bit culminating in "LotusFlow3r" and we also played on "Plant Earth" and "3121." It all led to a performance on "The Jay Leno Show" in 2009.

...continued

©2024 StarTribune. Visit startribune.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.