Biography

Gordon Matthew Sumner, CBE (born October 2, 1951), best known by his stage name Sting, is an English musician and formerly bassist and lead singer of The Police.

After disbanding the Police at the peak of their popularity in 1984, Sting quickly established himself as a viable solo artist, one obsessed with expanding the boundaries of pop music. Sting incorporated heavy elements of jazz, classical, and worldbeat into his music, writing lyrics that were literate and self-consciously meaningful, and he was never afraid to emphasize this fact in the press. For such unabashed ambition, he was equally loved and reviled, with supporters believing that he was at the forefront of literate, intelligent rock and his critics finding his entire body of work pompous. Either way, Sting remained one of pop's biggest superstars for the first ten years of his solo career, before his record sales began to slip.

Before the Police were officially disbanded, Sting began work on his first solo album late in 1984, rounding up a group of jazz musicians as a supporting band. Moving from bass to guitar, he recorded his solo debut, 1985's The Dream of the Blue Turtles, with Branford Marsalis, Kenny Kirkland, and Omar Hakim. 

The move wasn't entirely unexpected, since Sting had played with jazz and progressive rock bands in his youth, but the result was considerably more mature and diverse than any Police record. The album became a hit, with "If You Love Somebody Set Them Free," "Love Is the Seventh Wave," and "Fortress Around Your Heart" reaching the American Top Ten. 

Sting brought the band out on an extensive tour, which was captured on a documentary called Bring on the Night, which appeared in 1986, along with a live double album of the same name. That year, Sting participated in a half-hearted Police reunion that resulted in only one new song, a re-recorded version of "Don't Stand So Close to Me."

Following the aborted Police reunion, Sting began working on the ambitious Nothing Like the Sun, which was dedicated to his recently deceased mother. Working from a jazz foundation, and again collaborating with Marsalis, Sting worked with a number of different musicians on the album, including Gil Evans and former Police guitarist Andy Summers. 

The album received generally positive reviews upon its release in late 1987, and it generated hit singles with "We'll Be Together" and "They Dance Alone." Following its release, Sting began actively campaigning for Amnesty International and environmentalism, establishing the Rainforest Foundation, which was designed to raise awareness about preserving the Brazilian rainforest. An abridged Spanish version of Nothing Like the Sun, Nada Como el Sol, was released in 1988.

Sting took several years to deliver the follow-up to Nothing Like the Sun, during which time he appeared in a failed Broadway revival of The Threepenny Opera in 1989. His father also died, which inspired 1991's The Soul Cages, a dense, dark, and complex album. 

Although the album peaked at number two and spawned the Top Ten hit "All This Time," the record was less successful than its predecessor. Two years later, he delivered Ten Summoner's Tales, a light, pop-oriented record that became a hit on the strength of two Top 20 singles, "If I Ever Lose My Faith in You" and "Fields of Gold." At the end of 1993, "All for Love," a song he recorded with Rod Stewart and Bryan Adams for The Three Musketeers, became a number one hit. The single confirmed that Sting's audience had shifted from new wave/college rock fans to adult contemporary, and the 1994 compilation Fields of Gold: The Best of Sting played to that audience.

Three years after Ten Summoner's Tales, Sting released Mercury Falling in the spring of 1996. Although the album debuted highly, it quickly fell down the charts, stalling at platinum sales and failing to generate a hit single. While the album failed, Sting remained a popular concert attraction, confirming his immense popularity. Brand New Day followed in 1999. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide

The Police: In 1977, Sting, Stewart Copeland, and Andy Summers formed the rock/pop band The Police in London. The group had several chart topping albums and won six Grammy Awards in the early 1980s, including their arguably best well-known song, Every Breath You Take. Their last album, Synchronicity was released in 1983. The Police attempted a reunion in 1986 with a re-recording of their song "Don't Stand So Close to Me", but did not stay together.

Personal life: Sting married actress Frances Tomelty, a Catholic from Northern Ireland, on May 1, 1976. The couple had two children, Joseph (born 1976), and Catherine (born 1982), before they divorced in 1984. Soon after, Sting began living with actress (and later film producer) Trudie Styler, but the two did not marry until 1992. Sting and Trudie have four children (Bridget Michael (aka "Mickey"), James, Eliot Pauline ("Coco"), and Giacomo Luke). Sting's lookalike son Joseph (from his first marriage) is following in his dad's musical footsteps and is a member of a band, Although Sting also owns properties in England and Malibu, California, he currently calls Tuscany, Italy his home.

It is unclear whether he was serious or not when he referred to himself as manic-depressive. He has written a song entitled "Lithium Sunset" which appears to refer to lithium carbonate, a treatment for the disorder. According to some reports, he did this because he wanted to help people who really have this disease. In an interview given by Sting, he also referred to what he believed was the natural occurrence of lithium in the brain when one views a sunset, but this may have been a confusion with endorphins. Although Sting was long reputed to be a devotee of tantric sex, he has more recently claimed that it was an interview prank, or a dinner-party joke that took on a life of its own.

In early 2005, Sting proclaimed that he admires Hinduism, wants to spend a lot more time in India and that he loves Indian culture. 

 

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