C.J.: Piece of purple past posted at a princely price

Do you desperately need to own a teeny-tiny piece of Prince's Purple House?

A Twin Cities man who wishes to remain anonymous is selling what he says is a teeny-tiny piece of that Chanhassen residence for a starting bid of $1,500 on eBay.

By teeny-tiny, I mean a piece a little larger than a quarter (based on the size-reference photo: www.startribune.com/a1127).

Since it's concrete, painted a light purple color, the seller assumes it's from the home's foundation. "ONE OF A KIND PRINCE MEMORABILIA" declares the description on eBay.

Snatch it up before Prince's lawyers get into the act.

This is apparently what's left of the Lake Riley residence Prince had demolished in 2003. His father, John Nelson, was living in the Purple House at the time of his 2001 death. The Lake Riley residence is not to be confused with another structure that Prince, famed historical preservationist, razed on Lake Ann in 2005. That's on a gorgeous piece of land that was Prince's primary residence before he started living mostly elsewhere.

"If you are a Prince fan, here's your chance to own something no one else in the world can say they have," reads the eBay listing. "This piece of Prince's former Lake Riley house has been in my possession for many years. I like Prince's music, but I know someone else would appreciate this piece more than I do."

When asked about the word "symolina" that the seller advises eBay buyers to use as a search word, he said: "A misspelling there?"

It leapt out because I coined the nickname Symbolina for Prince, who absolutely despises the sobriquet, according to former Paisley Park denizens. Seemed rather natural to me after Prince decided, for a period, to adopt a glyph as his name. Symbolina responded, naturally, by writing a song about me: "Billy Jack Bitch."

The memorabilia seller agreed with me that symolina sounded like a great name for a special purple Italian pasta flour.

Dakota's got a 'Brand New Key'

We've come a long way since 1971, when Melanie's song "Brand New Key" was deemed too racy by some radio station executives, who detected sexual imagery in the lyrics.

As we talked Tuesday, I was reminded that before Prince got religious he would simulate sexual movements on stage; rapper Akon took it much further, more horrifyingly, with a girl under 16 years of age; and don't get me started on the vulgar sexual language that comes out of some rappers' and singers' mouths these days.

Melanie was too polite to call out artists whose music she thinks should be banned. After a big laugh, the folk singer and songwriter said, "You know, I don't even think that way, [but] I don't like degrading songs."

"Brand New Key" came to Melanie as she was coming off a 27-day water fast. She was trying to figure out if she should was cut out to be a vegetarian when she was overcome by the aromas wafting out of a McDonald's.

"I had the whole combo -- burger, fries and milk shake," she recalled. "I no sooner finished that last bite when I had this whoosh of remembering how to roller stake when I was little and riding my bike and my dad holding the [seat and asking], Are you holding on? And you look back and you see him and you fall down. It came right out of me. It wasn't calculated -- 'You put a key in a hole' -- I wasn't thinking like that. It just came out."

Before "Brand New Key" she wrote a gospel hit, "Lay Down (Candles in the Rain)," which she sang with the Edwin Hawkins Singers. "Oh my God," Melanie said when I admitted never having heard that song. "It was right after 'Oh, Happy Day.' In some places [Candles] was bigger than 'Brand New Key.'"

"I won 'Jazz Singer of the Year' at Montreux Jazz Festival because they didn't know what to do with me: White girl singing with black choir? OK, it must be jazz." She also wrote "Look What They've Done To My Song, Ma," which was a big R&B hit for Ray Charles.

"It was the first time I knew I was a songwriter -- Ray Charles, a stylist, singing my song. My God. It was much more important to me when he did it than when the New Seekers did it; they basically aped my version," she said.

Hedren endorses Guthrie 'Birds'

Tippi Hedren couldn't pass up the opportunity to see a theatrical production of "The Birds" while she was in the metro for a "Marnie" screening at the Heights Theater in Columbia Heights.

Hedren's people called the Guthrie to say she really wanted to see its interpretation of "The Birds," which like "Marnie" was among the classic movies made by Alfred Hitchcock.