Like when any other legendary musician dies, several tributes have been made in Prince’s honour after his untimely death last week at age 57.

Not only was Prince Rogers Nelson a singer, songwriter and performer, but he was also an extremely skilled guitarist. Due to his masterful showmanship, it was easy to forget that he was one of the greatest guitarists in any music field, thus making him very underrated as a musician.

Over a wide range of styles including funk, rock and blues, he knew his way around a guitar fretboard like the back of his hand, and effortlessly delivered beauty and passion through his music. He relied on intuition to make the notes he played match the music he wrote, driven from feel and emotion.

By the time he was 20, Prince was already recording one-man solo albums. He has also been credited for the invention of the Minneapolis sound, as well as the restoration of funk during the post-disco period in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s. Initially, Prince was inspired by artists and composers such as Jimi Hendrix, Stevie Wonder, Miles Davis and the Beatles, as well as soul and RnB legends including James Brown, Larry Graham and The Jackson 5. As clear as his influences were, Prince remained unique, and is now considered to be one of the incredible and legendary one-man orchestras, along with his influences.

Some of Prince’s top guitar solo numbers include “While My Guitar Gently Weeps”, “Purple Rain”, “Let’s Go Crazy”, “I Wanna Be Your Lover”, “When Doves Cry”, and “Controversy”, as well as some of his covers and collaboration performances including Radiohead’s “Creep” and his performance of “American Woman” with Lenny Kravitz and “Superstition” with Stevie Wonder.

During these solos and more, Prince’s fingers danced across the guitar, producing such mesmerising and passionate sounds that even when he made any “errors” they sounded good, proving that he could truly be considered the king of the guitar, and thus one of the most underrated guitarists of all time.

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The notebook used by Queen’s late frontman Freddie Mercury is to be sold at an auction in June.

Written in between 1988 and 1990, the personal notebook contains handwritten lyrics to, either full or partial, 19 of Queen’s final songs including ‘The Show Must Go On’ and ‘Too Much Love Will Kill You’ from the band’s ‘The Miracle’ and ‘Innuendo’.

When ‘The Show Must Go On’ was recorded in 1990, Mercury was so ill that Brian May had concerns as to whether he was physically capable of singing it, but he smashed it in one take. The song was released in October 1991, just six weeks before Mercury’s untimely death, at the age of 45.

“It is a poignant record of that period but it also struck me that it is a testament to the creative energy in the band,” Stephen Maycock of auctioneers Bonhams said.

“Despite his illness and increasing frailty the ideas were still there. His performance on that last album was remarkable considering how frail he was, his vocal powers on some of the tracks are just extraordinary… he did have this incredible drive.”

The auction house tracked down the exact shop on Goldhawk Road in London, where Mercury had originally purchased the standard issue notebook.

“There are plenty of collectors out there who I’m sure would love to have this – it’s because it is so personal, he had it there with him for nearly three years. It gives you a really close connection,” Maycock said.

The notebook is to be sold at Bonhams’ entertainment memorabilia auction on June 29^th, at an estimated price of £70,000 – £100,000.

The legendary Beatle has announced plans that he shall be releasing a sprawling compilation covering his extensive solo career.

The collection, which will be released around June 10th, will be available in three different formats of varying length and track lists. The four-CD set will boast 67 songs, while the two-CD collection will feature 49 tracks and the four-vinyl LP 46.

All three collections will comprise of a healthy selection of classic Paul McCartney hits, stretching from McCartney’s early solo career right up to his recent remix of “Say Say Say,” his classic Michael Jackson collaboration from the 80’s.

McCartney has also added a few of his own personal favourites, ones that fans may not expect to be on the list.

McCartney will kick off his latest tour, “One on One,” next month with a handful of North American dates followed by a brief European run.

SoundCloud recently announced the finalisation of a new licensing deal with Song Music Entertainment (SME) which would let its users listen to move songs, with SME artists now able to profit from the music provider. The deal, similar to other arrangements with Warner Music, Universal Music Group, and Merlin, means that Soundcloud can ‘continue to build a unique platform and empower our community of more than 10 million artists to share their work and connect directly with their fans’, stated the company’s blog, ‘it also means listeners will have more excellent music and audio to discover’

This partnership is important because the label (SME) is, according to Tech Crunch, the biggest music publisher in the world, and is already well known for having deals with music streaming services Spotify and Pandora.

Sony’s president of global digital business, Dennis Kooker, stated that the agreement ‘created a business framework for the use of Song Music songs on the SoundCloud platform that meets the needs of our artists and labels and supports growth of SoundCloud through its new premium on-demand music tier’. In addition, SoundCloud’s new relationship with SME ties in nicely with the provider’s plan to launch a subscription service later this year – a plan which was first expected in 2015, but was put off for reasons unknown to the public.