John L. Nelson
Artist
As Prince Rogers, John L. Nelson carved out a career as a jazz musician in the Minneapolis area in the 1950s but he will forever be known as the father of Prince, the genre-bending superstar of the 1980s.
Prince credited John L. Nelson with several collaborations during his peak in the 1980s – “Computer Blue”, “Around the World in a Day”, “Christopher Tracy’s Parade”, “Under the Cherry Moon”, and “Scandalous!” all bore his name, usually because they carried a chord sequence Prince had heard on music by his father – but during his period as an active musician, the pianist didn’t break out of his hometown.
Nelson lived in Minnesota until his death in 2001 – he was estranged from Prince throughout his son’s adolescence and early adulthood. In 2018, many of his compositions were recorded and released as Don’t Play with Love, a project masterminded by Sharon L. Nelson – the eldest child from John’s first marriage and a half-sister to Prince – and featuring Louis Hayes.
