Mercury Falling: 1996/97

Sting's sophisticated jazz-tinged rock - He kicked off his Italian tour at the Palasport in Casalecchio...

Four songs from his latest album, 'Mercury Falling,' opened Sting's concert in Bologna, but it's the former Police's older, more glorious history that dominates. Last Wednesday's concert was the first of ten dates for Sting in Italy; with a couple of songs in the afternoon on the Primo Maggio stage in Piazza San Giovanni in Rome, he announced the dates to a huge audience. Eight thousand people attended the Palasport in Casalecchio, where Sting appeared a few hours later. They waited to hear Antonella Ruggiero, former lead singer of Matia Bazar, introduce her new album, Libera.

Sting is dressed head to toe in black leather by Versace. His coat lasts only for the first two songs: 'The Hounds of Winter,' a melancholy ballad of life slipping away, and 'I Was Hung My Head.' By the opening bars of "I Was Brought to My Senses," he's already in shirtsleeves, in a zebra-print optical illusion. He'll sing, non-stop, for a little under two hours, alternating the more thoughtful, almost refined songs from "Mercury Falling" with many songs from the Police's more distant past, from which he draws an extraordinary "Roxanne," and from the recent solo career of "The Dream of the Blue Turtles," "Nothing Like the Sun," and "Ten Summoner's Tales." He doesn't run, he doesn't dance (with a few exceptions), he doesn't jump: Sting sings, still very well, and plays, his voice never faltering, allowing himself only a sip of water every now and then. A tour of very close dates awaits him: tonight at the Palastampa in Turin, tomorrow at the Assago Forum, on the 5th in Bolzano, on the 7th at VillaManin in Codroipo (Udine), on the 9th at the Palasport in Florence. The 10th at the Palaeur in Rome, the 12th in Acireale (Catania), the 13th in Naples, and the 14th in Pescara.

On stage, behind him, a row of large screens lights up, song after song, with evocative images and colours; on the backdrop, higher up, sophisticated interweavings of lights flow, creating a very fluid, hypnotic effect. Everything is extremely clean, orderly, and limpid. Dominic Miller is on guitar, Vincenzo Colaiuta on drums, and Kenny Kirkland, who also accompanied him on the 'Bring On The Night' tour, is on keyboards; on a platform that raises them and isolates them from the stage, the two wind instruments, Conrad Thomas II on trumpet and trombone, and Gayton Carver on saxophone, play. They are the two wild cards of the evening, fun, irreverent, and highly effective. The entire concert has an unmistakable flavour of jazz and soul: it's the sound that envelops Sting's latest album, it's the colour with which the former Police member now also paints the rock and reggae of his past, the old songs that forcefully occupy an ever-larger space in the setlist, to the ever-growing enthusiasm of the audience.

He begins with "If You Love Somebody Set Them Free" from "The Dream of the Blue Turtles," continues with "Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic" from "Ghost in the Machine," and the Palasort lights up. From "Ten Summoner's Tales," he chooses a hit, "Seven Days"; from "The Soul Cages," "Mad About You"; from "Nothing Like the Sun," another hit, "Englishman in New York," sung by eight thousand voices.

He returns to his latest album with three songs, then it's the past again, that of the Police, that bursts in.

Sting sings "Synchronicity," then blends "Roxanne" first into a long trombone solo, then into a full-blown jam session that reaches its climax with "When The World Is Running Down," from the prehistory of "Zenyatta Mondatta": a sort of tribute to Kirkland's keyboards, concluding with a four-piece improvisation (the two horns, Sting's bass, and the keyboards) in a corner of the stage. It seems like it's time to say goodbye, but no: there's still "If I Ever Lose My Faith In You," but above all "Every Breath You Take," which overshadows the otherwise beautiful "Lithium Sunset" from "Mercury Falling." And abandoning the bass and the band, picking up the acoustic guitar, Sting bids his farewell alone with the unplugged strains of "Fragile."

(c) La Repubblica by Brunella Torresin (thanks to Valeria Vanella)