Sting: My Songs Tour: 2021 - 2023

Sting in Erfurt - Nine thousand and the power of his voice...

He simply sings the songbook of his many hits. At seventy, he gives concert number 134 of his world tour in Erfurt – and thrills 9,000 people with ageless, fine musical craftsmanship. Sting in the exhibition hall: magnificent.

Only the exterior of his 1954 Fender bass guitar looks worn this evening. The way he strides onto the stage with such verve and then stands there, muscular, his back straight, with a broad gesture in his horizontally striped T-shirt. "Hello Erfurt." And then launches into "Message in a Bottle" and a voice that seems to encompass the entire enormous exhibition hall, along with the nine thousand souls who have been waiting for him here: Wow. Sting. Is. Here. And how!

It is concert number 134 of the British superstar's "My Songs Tour," which began in May 2019 – and was interrupted twice by the coronavirus pandemic. And this hot summer evening in Erfurt feels as if the 70-year-old and his young six-person accompaniment have just returned from rehearsals and not already in the last third of a tour through America, Japan and Europe.

It takes a few songs, though, before Sting's energy fully breaks through the notorious brass sound of the Erfurt exhibition hall, which tends to mash loud rock to a pulp. And the mix of Sting's casual, piercing bass and dry beat, once typical of "The Police," unfortunately doesn't quite cut through. But by "Every Little Thing She Does Its Magic," the spark jumps over, even to the seats surrounding a standing-room arena – generously proportioned, given the average age of the concertgoers – as powerfully packed and surging as probably never before in Thuringia since this damned pandemic denied us such experiences.

But what are we talking about rock sound? It's Sting's voice that gives this concert its power. It no longer has that cutting, hoarse quality. This youthful, torn, snotty quality that has inscribed legendary songs like "So Lonely" and "Roxane" deep into the personal party history of today's 50-plus generation. But we're no longer at a drunken youth party from 1980, and we don't need the post-pubescent soul-soothing of the past; instead, we're listening to the finest songbook from an artist, rich in multimillion-dollar hits, who has truly aged very well. What it lacks in edge, it more than makes up for with confident tension.

Holding back and letting go, wallowing, silence, joking, and, yes, even for a moment, really letting it all out, so that his aging voice occasionally cracks: Sting knows how to balance it all and never loses the energy and tension that many a veteran star over seventy struggles to sustain for 90 minutes.

A bit of "No Woman No Cry" sprinkled into "So Lonely," the joy of playing garnished with reggae and jazz influences, the "Englishman in New York," he really strolls. Transitions, contrasts. And yes, he also gives his fans space to sing along, soulfully, nostalgically, just as it should be, and not too much that it becomes cheesy. And then there's atmospheric lighting and fellow musicians dressed in black, who fit it all around the shining light in the black and red T-shirt. Sting, who still manages to give the harmonica player his Stevie Wonder moment and the backup singer a magnificently short R&B aria. Sting's regular guitarist Dominic Miller makes you forget that the other two members of the former "Police" family are missing. A total work of art. World-class in time, space, and sound.

At the very end, as a second and final encore, the master enchants the audience with "Fragile" on a gentle Spanish guitar and leaves. "Thanks. Erfurt."

"Jagger played for over two hours the other day," says one person as he leaves, immediately smiling away his own objection and leaving the hall with another 8,999 happy people towards the tram. The tram curves around the cathedral steps on its way to the main station and offers a chance glimpse of the final scenes of "Nabucco" with its garish stage bombast.

Sting is handed the Fenders, the T-shirt, a few eternal songs, and his voice. Every little thing you do is magic.

With 33 more concerts, the "My Songs" tour enters its final phase. Anyone who still wants to go will have to travel. Next concerts: Tonight, July 28, Berlin, Spandau Citadel. October 10, Zurich, Hallenstadion.

(c) inSüdthüringen by Markus Ermert