ABOUT STING
Composer, singer-songwriter, actor, author, and activist Sting was born in Newcastle, England before moving to London in 1977 to form The Police with Stewart Copeland and Andy Summers. The band released five studio albums, earned six GRAMMY Awards® and two Brits, and was inducted into The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2003.
One of the world’s most distinctive solo artists, Sting has received an additional 11 GRAMMY Awards®, two Brits, a Golden Globe, an Emmy, four Oscar nominations, a TONY nomination, Billboard Magazine’s Century Award, and MusiCares 2004 Person of the Year. In 2003, he was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) by Queen Elizabeth II for his myriad of contributions to music. Also a member of the Songwriters Hall of Fame, he has received the Kennedy Center Honors, The American Music Award of Merit and The Polar Music Prize. Sting has been awarded Honorary Doctorates of Music by the University of Northumbria (1992), Berklee College of Music (1994), University of Newcastle upon Tyne (2006) and Brown University at its 250th Commencement ceremony (2018).
Throughout his illustrious career, Sting has sold 100 million albums from his combined work with The Police and as a solo artist.
Following his critically acclaimed album, 57th & 9th, his first rock/pop collection in over a decade, Sting and reggae icon, Shaggy, both managed by Martin Kierszenbaum/ Cherrytree Music Company, released a collaborative, island-influenced album, entitled 44/876, drawing from the many surprising connections at the heart of their music. With its title referencing their home country codes, 44/876 first and foremost honors the duo’s mutual love for Jamaica: Shaggy’s homeland, and the place where Sting penned such classics as The Police’s “Every Breath You Take.” Their release spent over 20 weeks atop Billboard’s Reggae Album chart in the US, earned Gold certifications in Poland and France and received the GRAMMY Award® for Best Reggae Album.
In 2019, Sting was honoured at the BMI Pop Awards for his enduring hit single “Every Breath You Take,” which has become the Most Performed Song, with 15 million radio plays, from BMI’s catalog of over 14 million musical works. The song was also added to Spotify’s ‘Billions Club,’ having amassed over 1 billion streams on the platform.
Also in 2019, an album entitled My Songs, featuring contemporary interpretations of his most celebrated hits, was released and followed by a world tour of the same name. Sting’s ‘My Songs’ concert is a dynamic and exuberant show featuring his most beloved songs spanning the 17-time GRAMMY Award® winner’s prolific career with The Police and as a solo artist. Full tour itinerary can be found here.
Always known as a musical explorer, pioneering genre-bending sounds and collaborations, Sting’s next release Duets, compiles some of his most celebrated collaborations, including those with Mary J. Blige, Herbie Hancock, Eric Clapton, Annie Lennox, Charles Aznavour, Mylène Farmer, Shaggy, Melody Gardot, Gashi and more.
Sting’s latest album, The Bridge, showcases his prolific and diverse songwriting prowess. Representing various stages and styles from throughout his unrivaled career and drawing inspiration from genres including rock n’ roll, jazz, classical music and folk, the eclectic album features Sting’s quintessential sound on pop-rock tracks such as the album’s opening rock salvo “Rushing Water” and new indie-pop sounding “If It’s Love.”
Sting kicked off his Las Vegas residency, “My Songs,” at The Colosseum at Caesars Palace to rave reviews. The show presented a compendium of his most beloved songs with dynamic, visual references to some of his most iconic videos and inspirations with Sting treating fans to an array of greatest hits spanning his illustrious career, including “Roxanne,” “Message In A Bottle,” “Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic,” “Every Breath You Take” and several other fan favorites, plus brand new songs from his latest album, The Bridge.
Sting produced Shaggy’s latest album, Com Fly Wid Mi which finds the dancehall/reggae icon performing the Sinatra songbook in a reggae style. The album received a Grammy Award nomination for Best Reggae Album. To celebrate its release, Sting hosted a party at the legendary Blue Note Jazz Club in NYC where Shaggy performed the album in full.
Earlier this year, Sting became a Fellow of the Ivors Academy – the highest honor reserved for those who have reshaped and redefined the art and craft of music creation. The event, presented by Amazon Music, celebrates songwriters and took place on May 18 in London. To commemorate Sting’s honor, an unheard demo of “If It’s Love,” is available here.
Sting and Shaggy recently launched the One Fine Day Festival in Philadelphia, a full day of eclectic music, for which they personally curated & co-headlined, featuring a diverse artist lineup – Thundercat, Koffee, Tank and the Bangas, Philly’s own G. Love & Special Sauce, Kes, Flor de Toloache, and French/ Italian sensation, Giordana Angi - across two stages exclusively at The Mann in Fairmount Park in Philadelphia, PA. The two icons performed their biggest hits together, trading off and collaborating on ‘Every Breath You Take,’ ‘Englishman In New York,’ ‘Message In A Bottle,’ ‘It Wasn’t Me,’ ‘Boombastic’ and ‘Angel’ and more.
Sting has appeared in more than 15 films, executive produced the critically acclaimed A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints, and in 1989 starred in The Threepenny Opera on Broadway. His most recent theatre project is the Tony®-nominated musical The Last Ship, inspired by his memories of the shipbuilding community of Wallsend in the northeast of England where he was born and raised. The show, with music and lyrics by Sting, ran on Broadway in 2014/2015 and completed a UK regional theatre tour which ran from March-July 2018. Thereafter, Sting starred as shipyard foreman Jackie White in the Toronto-based production of The Last Ship at the Princess of Wales Theatre. In 2020, he reprised the role for productions in Los Angeles at the Ahmanson Theatre and San Francisco at the Golden Gate Theatre.
Sting’s support for human rights organizations such as the Rainforest Fund, Amnesty International, and Live Aid mirrors his art in its universal outreach. Along with wife Trudie Styler, Sting founded the Rainforest Fund in 1989 to protect both the world’s rainforests and the indigenous people living there. Together they have held 19 benefit concerts to raise funds and awareness for our planet’s endangered resources. Since its inception, the Rainforest Fund has expanded to a network of interconnected organizations working in more than 20 countries over three continents.
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