AAPL Apple Inc

By Hannah Karp 

LOS ANGELES--Two lawyers who have been vying for control over the estate of the late pop star Prince were both denied official roles by a judge last month. But neither man is going anywhere.

Veteran entertainment attorney L. Londell McMillan and CNN political commentator Van Jones were close advisers to Prince at different times in his life. Following the reclusive artist's drug-overdose death in April, the two have ignited a family feud among his six known heirs--a sister and five half-siblings--over issues including the singer's legacy, a memorial concert and the lawyers' own conflicts of interest.

Both men were in Los Angeles this week ahead of the music industry's Grammy Awards on Sunday. The same day, Prince's catalog will become available for the first time on major music-streaming services such as Spotify AB and Apple Inc.'s Apple Music, people familiar with the matter said.

The development comes nearly a year after Prince's death and offers a window into Mr. McMillan's vision for how best to manage the estate--a view that differs in some respects from that of Mr. Jones.

"Prince did not rush to put all of his music on streaming--why should we?" said Mr. McMillan, 50 years old, in an interview, having helped negotiate the latest licensing deals on the estate's behalf as one of the two court-appointed advisers to the estate's interim administrator, Bremer Trust. He no longer has that title with Bremer's replacement, Comerica Bank & Trust, which took over in January.

Mr. McMillan added that if he had been in control from the get-go, he would have more aggressively policed the videos of Prince's music that popped up without the estate's permission after his death, enlisting help from fans, even though "it would have cost a lot."

"I'm here to make sure the legacy of Prince does not go afoul from how he lived his life," he said. Prince hadn't wanted to license his music to most streaming services--save Jay Z's Tidal--during his life, Mr. McMillan and others close to him said.

Mr. Jones, 48, on the other hand, has seen more urgency in introducing Prince's music to new fans to keep his legacy alive, especially as the anniversary of his death approaches, people familiar with the matter said. He could also parlay his own current fame as a pundit and documentarian into opportunities for the estate, these people added.

In a court filing last month, Mr. Jones's team said that the Prince tribute concert Mr. McMillan organized in October was mismanaged and "has not been produced into a television event or documentary that could enhance and build the Prince brand."

Mr. McMillan said that the sold-out show was a success.

Prince loathed the notion of entertainment executives exploiting his music for their own gain and opted whenever possible to manage his own affairs, according to many who knew him. Nonetheless he left no will, leading to the current fights over his estate. The estate's value has been estimated at roughly $200 million--about half of that after taxes--and now belongs to his six estranged siblings, under Minnesota state law. Assets include nearly $1 million in gold bars, $25 million in real estate and a "vault" of recordings that Prince never released, according to court filings.

As planning for the estate got under way last year, the two men began vying for the heirs' allegiance, though Mr. McMillan said he never intended to divide them.

Mr. Jones, who met Prince in 2008 and helped negotiate one of his record deals, began representing the late singer's half-brother Omarr Baker in August and his younger sister, Tyka Nelson, in December. Mr. McMillan, who considered himself Prince's "co-pilot" and "COO" in the '90s until peeling off to work with other clients such as the late pop star Michael Jackson, has won the allegiance of Prince's other half-siblings: Sharon Nelson, Alfred Jackson, John Nelson and Norrine Nelson. Having shifted to private equity in recent years, he is now acting as their business adviser, not their attorney.

Alfred Jackson's brother and personal affairs manager, Bruce Jackson, said in an email that they decided to "have a substantial business relationship" with Mr. McMillan because he was Prince's longest-serving manager and had guided "Prince in the right direction" with an impressive work ethic.

Sharon Nelson said in an email that Mr. McMillan's bond with Prince "resulted in innovative changes in the music business" and that she was wary of non-experts or "others who wish to support their own agenda."

"He has done a great job in the face of continuous opposition," Ms. Nelson wrote.

The other heirs declined to comment.

Mr. McMillan has already helped sell rights to license various aspects of Prince's music to several different companies. Vivendi SA's Universal Music Group said Thursday that it had bought licensing rights to Prince's 25 independently released albums and his "highly anticipated trove" of unreleased works known as "the vault." The record company spent about $30 million on the deal, which is good for at least five years, according to people familiar with the matter.

Warner Music Group, the record label that issued his first 18 albums containing most of his hits, maintains its majority ownership of those works in perpetuity overseas, though its U.S. copyrights on some of them will expire in coming years and will now go to Universal Music as part of its deal.

Immediately after Prince died, Messrs. Jones and McMillan both traveled to Minneapolis for his memorial service and met in person for the first time. It was a friendly encounter during which Mr. McMillan said he made clear that he was "very, very concerned that the estate needed to be handled properly and efficiently" and that he "knew that there weren't many people" up to the job.

A judge in January appointed Comerica Bank to take over from Bremer as the estate's administrator, naming neither Mr. McMillan nor Mr. Jones to aid the bank, despite the heirs' divided nominations for each. But both intend to remain involved.

"I actually had wanted to work with everybody--but somehow, some way, it became very weird with two [of the] heirs," Mr. McMillan said.

Write to Hannah Karp at hannah.karp@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

February 11, 2017 09:15 ET (14:15 GMT)

Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL)
Historical Stock Chart
From Mar 2024 to Apr 2024

Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL)
Historical Stock Chart
From Apr 2023 to Apr 2024