Sting Comes to Mohegan Sun Arena – May 15, 2022

Legendary singer and bass player Sting came to Connecticut on his “My Songs” tour, where he’s playing, you guessed it, his songs. With a huge catalog of material ranging from The Police to his solo albums, Mohegan Sun was in for a great night of music!

Joe Sumner

Kicking off the night was Joe Sumner. If that last name sounds familiar, it may be because you’ve heard of his father, Gordon Sumner… AKA Sting. Joe regularly tours as the opening act for his father, just him and a guitar, helping the audience settle in with some acoustic music. It’s not hard to hear the relation to Sting as he’s performing, Joe has definitely inherited some of his musical sound. His short, mellow set also included a pair of songs from his band Fiction Plane, who opened for The Police on their reunion tour in 2007.

Sting

With over 100 million albums sold across his various projects, not many people have had as successful a musical career as Sting. He and the band entered the stage playing “Message in a Bottle,” the classic Police song. The 70-year-old performer played for nearly two hours, with 21 songs in his show! With a set of that length, fans of all timelines of Sting’s career would find something to enjoy tonight. Solo hits like “If You Love Somebody Set Them Free,” “Fields of Gold” and “Desert Rose” were all there, while Police tracks like “Every Little Thing She Does is Magic,” “Walking on the Moon” and “King of Pain” were there too.

Sting released his 15th solo studio album, The Bridge, back in December. After starting the show off with a variety of hits, he spoke straight to the audience, and said “We’re at the portion of the show where you have to hear some new music,” playing four songs in a row off the album. He spoke often to the crowd in between songs, sharing stories as the night went on. Before playing the first single off of The Bridge, “If It’s Love,” he told a story about being on the road, and waking up in a hotel. He could hear workers outside his room who were whistling, and he realized they were whistling the Police classic “Roxanne.” It made him think about how important it was for a song to be catchy enough to whistle, so he actually included whistling in the song.

The band backing Sting up was quite talented. While guitar player Dominic Miller has been collaborating with Sting for over 30 years, the rest of the band were all kids, relatively speaking. Before playing his song “Brand New Day,” Sting mentioned how lucky he was to have Stevie Wonder play the harmonica. He then ribbed at his touring harmonica player, asking him if he feels confident that he can do justice to it (and he did).

The tail end of the set was much more heavy on songs from The Police catalog. While playing “So Lonely,” he spoke in the middle, admitting that the song borrowed heavily from “No Woman No Cry,” and proceeded to play a verse and chorus of that song in the middle of this one.

The highlight for many came with two of The Police songs at the end, the back to back of “Every Breath You Take” into “Roxanne.” Finishing off the show with the title track of The Bridge, Sting left the nearly sold-out crowd satisfied in a way that only a true legend can.