THE LIMITATIONS OF POP MUSIC GENIUS
Brief case studies of Ray Charles, Stevie Wonder, Prince and maybe Kanye West
Lyrical philosopher Paul Simon once sang, “Every generation throws a hero up the pop charts.” This essay is mostly about three such heroes.
Stevie Wonder is a genius. So was Ray Charles and Prince. All three musical masters who, at some point, couldn’t sell big numbers records anymore. Yet there was a period when each man – Charles in the late ‘50s, Wond…