Fender Stratocaster

The Fender Stratocaster is an electric guitar played by Prince in his early career and again in the 2000s.

Some of the earliest photographs of Prince in the studio show him playing white and sunburst Stratocasters. Although Prince usually played other guitars live, it was used in the studio from For You to Controversy.

While in Tokyo on the One Nite Alone tour, Prince purchased a Fender Japan ST57-70TX in Sonic Blue (alongside the Daisy Rock Heartbreaker Artist, ESP AM J-4 and ESP XJ-Crystal). He played this guitar on the tour, beginning another long-running association with the Stratocaster.

He then began using several customized Stratocasters. They are all 50’s style Stratocasters with maple fingerboards. They all have an EMG single coil in the neck and a humbucker in the bridge with the controls reduced to a single volume and tone (similar to the Cloud). The Strat vibrato was also replaced with a Floyd-Rose locking nut and vibrato system. These guitars were mostly used for rhythm playing:

• Daphne Blue - A Fender 50’s Stratocaster (Mexican) from 2003 (serial number MZ2234287). This guitar was suffered water damaged during the Superbowl performance.
• Capri Orange - This appears to be a Fender Japan ST57-58. It has matching woodgrain effect pickup covers, scratchplate and controls.
• Purple - Probably a custom finish.
• Red - Seen at the Montreux Jazz Festival in 2009 – possibly the purple Strat before it was refinished.

Prince’s final Stratocaster was a Fender Custom Shop Stratocaster built by Yuri Shishkov. Nicknamed “Goldfinger”, this model was covered in gold leaf, something Sishkov had been considering before he was commissioned by Prince to build such a guitar. Two Stratocasters were built – the prototype was auctioned and sold to Lewis Hamilton, while the second was played by Prince in 2011 and appears in promotional materials for his residency at the L.A. Forum. Unlike his earlier Stratocasters, these have more conventional pickups, controls and vibrato systems.

The ST57-70TX, blue, purple and orange Strats all appear in the Prince - Guitar & Bass book. Along with the gold Strat, these are all currently in the collection at Paisley Park.

Dez Dickerson also played a sunburst Fender Stratocaster on the 1999 tour.