Legal wrangles keep Prince music hidden

Will fans ever get to hear the full depths of Prince’s storied recording vault?

After the musician’s death in April 2016, attention focused on the trove of unreleased material that he kept hidden in two storage vaults at Paisley Park. Over the years, it has attained near-mythic status, and his associates have reported that it contained hundreds or even thousands of songs. Yet when Prince died — without a will or a plan for the music’s release — most of the vault was not even catalogued.

On Friday, a small glimpse of this trove emerged with a reissue of Purple Rain by Warner Bros. and NPG, including a bonus disc of unreleased material.

But a conflict in Prince’s estate over a $31-million (U.S.) deal with Uni- versal for music rights means that much of the vault may not see daylight for months or even years to come. And music industry lawyers say that copyright entanglements may even prohibit the release of more music.

For much of the last year, Prince’s estate has been in what the judge overseeing it called a state of “personal and corporate mayhem.”

By early this year, things appeared to be stabilizing, with a string of music deals announced with Universal and others. But Universal has said it wants to cancel its deal, saying it was “misled and likely defrauded” by representatives of Bremer Trust, the Minnesota bank charged with administering the estate.

According to Universal, some of the rights it had paid for conflicted with those held by Warner, through a confidential deal that company signed with Prince in 2014.