Celebration 2020 at Paisley Park will coincide with Prince's birth, not death

A new administration at Paisley Park means a new way of celebrating Prince.

Celebration 2020 will take place June 4-7 at Paisley Park in Chanhassen. The first three Celebrations coincided with the anniversary of Prince's death on April 21. Next year's event ends on June 7, which is his birthday.

This announcement was made via email to people on the official Paisley Park mailing list.

No further information was available. Nothing is posted yet on paisleypark.com.

Attendance at this year's Celebration was noticeably down from the previous two years.

Tickets typically cost $500 to $1,000, drawing fans from all over the world to hear panel discussions with Prince associates and insiders as well as watch unreleased concert footage and see live performances by the likes of the Revolution, Morris Day & the Time, Sheila E, George Clinton and others in the Purple orbit.

When Paisley Park opened as a museum in October 2016, it was run by Graceland Holdings, a company that also operates Elvis Presley's Graceland museum in Memphis. The contract with Graceland expired at the end of September, and Alan Seiffert, a New York music business veteran, was hired as Paisley's new executive director.

Since he took over on Oct. 1, Paisley Park has hosted released parties for local band Nooky Jones and Prince's "1999 Super Deluxe." A New Year's Eve event featuring the Funk Soldiers, Judith Hill and others will be held at Paisley this year.

Under Graceland, Paisley greatly limited the special events; Justin Timberlake held a private album-release party when he was in Minnesota for the Super Bowl in 2018, and this year an invite-only Women Who Rock program with Donna Grantis, Liv Warfield and others was presented by tech firm SAP.

Moving the Celebration to June probably makes sense for a few reasons: April has meant conflicts with Easter and Passover, potential bad weather (yes, sometimes it snows in April) and the awkwardness of commemorating the anniversary of Prince's death. June promises more hospitable weather and the celebration of his birth.