Prince death spurs tributes in purple
The life of the singer Prince, who has died at the age of 57, is being marked with purple-coloured tributes.
Buildings, newspaper front pages and websites across the US and beyond have changed colour in his honour.
Read more: US pop icon Prince found dead: media
For all latest news, follow The Daily Star's Google News channel. Prince was found dead at his Minnesota home on Thursday. He became a superstar in the 1980s, with the albums 1999, Purple Rain and Sign O' the Times.
No cause of death has been stated and a post-mortem investigation will take place on Friday.
US President Barack Obama said the world had "lost a creative icon".
Prince's innovative music spanned rock, funk and jazz. He sold more than 100 million records during his career.
In a statement, Carver County Sheriff Jim Olson said his deputies responded to a medical call at about 09:43 local time (14:43 GMT) and later found an unresponsive adult male in an elevator at Paisley Park Studios.
First responders tried to revive him but he was pronounced dead at 10:07.
In Prince's native Minneapolis, the Minnesota Twins baseball team turned their stadium purple, as did the Lowry Avenue Bridge in the centre of the city.
Other prominent buildings in New York and New Orleans were also given a new purple look. And while the Niagara Falls were turned purple to mark the Queen's 90th birthday, the coincidence was welcomed by Prince fans online.
MTV's Twitter logo has also turned purple. In the UK, the front page of the Sun newspaper featured a photo of Prince against a purple background with the headline: "Purple reign is over."
Vigils for the singer were held outside his home as well as in Los Angeles and Brooklyn, where the film director Spike Lee, a friend of Prince's, led an impromptu street party.
Born in 1958, Prince was a prolific writer and performer from a young age - reportedly writing his first song when he was seven.
He was also and arranger and multi-instrumentalist, and recorded more than 30 albums. His best-known hits include Let's Go Crazy and When Doves Cry.
He also wrote music for other artists. Nothing Compares 2U, written for The Family, was later made famous by Sinead O'Connor in 1990.
In 1984, he won an Oscar for the score to Purple Rain, a film in which he also starred.
Throughout his career he had a reputation for secrecy and eccentricity, once changing his name to an unpronounceable symbol.
In 2004, Prince was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, which said he "rewrote the rulebook".
He had a mercurial relationship with technology. In 2000, he released singles via the pioneering music-sharing service Napster, but he later declared the internet "completely over" and refused to allow his music on major streaming platforms.
Prince's latest album, HITnRUN Phase Two, was released last year and he had been touring as recently as last week.
On 15 April he was taken to hospital after his private plane made an emergency landing in Illinois. It happened just hours after he had performed on stage in Georgia. He was treated and released after a few hours.
Tributes have been pouring in from artists young and old, across the musical spectrum.
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