Back to 1986: The Night Prince Took Over Wyoming (Yes, Really)

There have been a plethora of major recording artists doing shows in the Cowboy State, especially in the more recent years with venues like Cheyenne Frontier Days and the Ford Wyoming Center, but it wasn't always like this.

Turn back the clock thirty-nine years, to July 1st, 1986. One of the world's biggest Rock stars, Prince, made his way to Sheridan, Wyoming, for the premiere of "Under the Cherry Moon", which was his directorial debut and the follow-up to his highly successful first film (and soundtrack), Purple Rain.

Why Sheridan, you ask? One extremely lucky fan, who was a Sheridan resident named Lisa Barber, won a contest on MTV, for a date with the multi-talented musical artist. Barber, who was a mere 20 years old at the time, was the 10,000 caller to win the famed date with Prince.

It was truly awesome to see how Prince interacted with the Wyo-folk, even as soon as he got off his private plane. In the above video, he throws his very expensive-looking jacket into the crowd of screaming fans (at 1:05 second mark). Considering Prince was 28 years old at the time and one of the biggest musical sensations on the planet, he could have reacted much differently, but he had nothing but nice things to say about the town of Sheridan, the residents, the scenery and his date.

The world premiere for "Under the Cherry Moon" was actually held in Sheridan at the Centennial Twin Theater, were several of the cast members attended. In addition to Prince and the Revolution, Joni Mitchell and Ray Parker, Jr. (probably most famously known for the Ghostbusters song), were also on site.

The evening concluded with an afterparty and a 45-minute private concert where Prince performed some of his biggest hits, including "Raspberry Berry" and "Purple Rain".

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Considering I was 10 years old in 1986, a Wyoming native (although I was living out of state at the time), and a super fan of both Prince and MTV, I don't know how I didn't know about this until almost thirty years later. I'm going to blame it on lack of internet for over half of that time frame. Regardless, this is one of the single coolest things to happen in the history of Sheridan and the entire state of Wyoming, at least in relation to Rock music.