Prince called the Grammys producers and asked to perform with Beyonce.
Although Ken Ehrlich – the longtime executive producer of the Grammy Awards, who was behind every Grammys telecast except one from 1980 to 2020 – tried for years to get Prince to take to the stage at the awards, it was only when Beyonce was announced as a performer in 2004 that Prince agreed to take part.
Ken told Variety: “He has a very limited but very impactful Grammy history. He had presented a few times where I had him on, but if you think about it, not much before ‘Baby I’m a Star’ with him and Beyonce. Every year I would call the guy and the first thing out of his mouth was, ‘Do you have $3 million?’ I’d say, ‘No.’ ‘Well, call me next year.’
“But for the Beyonce segment, he actually called me, and said, ‘Hey, I wanna be with Beyonce. Can you do anything? I have this great idea.'”
While the performance went on to be a showstopper as the pair sang ‘Purple Rain’, ‘Baby I’m a Star,’ ‘Crazy in Love’ and ‘Let’s Go Crazy’, Ken revealed Beyonce initially wasn’t keen on a joint performance.
He explained: “That was when I went to Matthew Knowles, and then wound up with Tina at this studio while Beyonce did a photo shoot, and convincing first her mother that she should do this, because she didn’t want to do it. She was up for ‘Dangerously in Love’ that year and said, ‘Why do I need to perform with Prince? (instead of getting a solo slot, though she ultimately got both). But Prince for me was always… it was a quest. He was incredibly enigmatic. I really was fond of him. He would try and be funny with you, you know? Sly is a better word — that’s what he was. So I tried to give that segment a little bit of who he was.”