Sting performs at Hard Rock, first visit to Gary: ‘I saved it for you’...

At precisely 7 p.m. Sunday night, Sting emerged on stage through swirls of misty fog, as if he just arrived from the United Kingdom—an Englishman in Northwest Indiana, if only for a few hours.

“This is my first time in your fair city,” he told the crowd at Hard Rock Casino Northern Indiana in Gary. “I don’t know why. I was just … saving you.”

The former frontman for the British rock band The Police took a short break to share a few sparse words with the appreciative audience after opening the two-hour set with “Message in a Bottle,” released nearly 40 years ago.

“This is my first time in your fair city,” Sting told the crowd at Hard Rock Casino Northern Indiana in Gary. “I don’t know why. I was just … saving you.”

“I have a little house in the English countryside,” Sting said in a voice that has aged like a fine wine. “Well, it’s more of a castle actually. If you ever go to Stonehenge, just come down a bit south and I’ll open the door and make a cup of tea. Just you, though.”

Sting didn’t talk too much in between songs. He spent words like hundred dollar bills, just enough to set the scene for an upcoming tune that most fans could sing in their sleep.

“We’re at a casino tonight, right?” Sting asked the audience. “This next song is about a professional gambler who is also something of a philosopher. Of course all gamblers become philosophers eventually.”

A second later, he began playing “The Shape of My Heart” from 1993.

“I know that the spades are the swords of a soldier. I know that the clubs are weapons of war. I know that diamonds mean money for this art. But that’s not the shape of my heart,” the 74-year-old musician crooned as mesmerized fans sang along in a trance.

At precisely 7 p.m. Sunday night, Sting emerged on stage through swirls of misty fog, as if he just arrived from the United Kingdom—an Englishman in Northwest Indiana, if only for a few hours.

Sting, whose birth name is Gordon Sumner, garnered his nickname because of a black and yellow striped sweater he frequently wore, making him look like a bee. On Sunday night, he wore a simple T-shirt with very short sleeves to expose muscular arms that gently cradled his beloved bass guitar.

“I’m not sure I could have a better life than this one, frankly,” he told the crowd.

No one doubted his public confession. Watch a video of his performance at NWI.com.

The Police arrived on the mainstream music scene in the late 1970s with their reggae-influenced albums, “Outlandos d’Amour” and “Regatta de Blanc,” back when I was in high school. Their soundscape was unique, a musical tapestry of new wave, punk, jazz and reggae, with lyrics that made you think about things bigger than yourself.

The current “Sting 3.0" tour is heating up every venue it plays in North America, featuring a power trio format with guitarist Dominic Miller and drummer Chris Maas. They play together like a synchronized watch, performing songs from Sting's expansive catalog, including familiar hits from The Police as well as from his successful solo career.

“There has to be an invisible sun. It gives its heat to everyone,” Sting sang.

His current “Sting 3.0” tour is heating up every venue it plays in North America, featuring a power trio format with guitarist Dominic Miller and drummer Chris Maas. They play together like a synchronized watch, performing songs from Sting’s expansive catalog, including familiar hits from The Police as well as from his successful solo career.

“There are different kinds of love songs,” Sting told fans Sunday. “The least interesting kind of love song is this one—I love you, and you love me. Whereas, I love you but you belong to somebody else. Now that’s interesting.”

These words prefaced the next song, “When We Dance,” his 1994 ballad about forbidden love: “He won’t love you like I love you. He won’t care for you this way.”

The “Sting 3.0" tour is heating up every venue it plays in North America, featuring a power trio format with guitarist Dominic Miller, shown here, and drummer Chris Maas. They play together like a synchronized watch, performing songs from Sting's expansive catalog, including familiar hits from The Police as well as from his successful solo career.

Sting performed just a couple of deep cuts that most fans didn’t sing along to, but they still swayed back and forth in the gentle rhythm of the moment. His voice was rich, his stage presence was impeccable, his bass lines were as familiar as old friends.

“I need to rest my bones,” Sting said at one point, sitting on a stool to perform a few more songs.

Flanked by two jumbo screens on each side of the stage, the venue’s welcoming acoustics embraced guests as a dazzling light show flashed related images across the stage and into the crowd. Every note hit just right, especially for fans like me who’ve embraced these notes for decades.

Sting performed just a couple of deep cuts that most fans didn’t sing along to, but they still swayed back and forth in the gentle rhythm of the moment. His voice was rich, his stage presence was impeccable, his bass lines were as familiar as old friends.

“Walked out this morning, I don’t believe what I saw, a hundred billion bottles washed up on the shore,” Sting serenaded to the crowd. “Seems I’m not alone in being alone. Hundred billion castaways looking for a home.”

For those two hours, everyone there washed up on the same shore for a similar reason—to share a fresh moment and a lifetime of musical memories. The band returned to stage after the first encore to perform “Roxanne,” an early hit about a man in love with a sex worker, as red lights strobed through the audience.

For the second encore, Sting sat down again to share a few last words.

“I’m going to leave with you something quiet and thoughtful,” he said. “Go home quiet and thoughtful.”

As the crowd settled down for the final song of the night, Sting played “Fragile” with a raw tenderness that touches us all in different ways: “Like tears from a star, how fragile we are, how fragile we are.”

(c) NWITimes by Jerry Davich

Sting 3.0 tour comes to Hard Rock Live in Gary...

British 80s rock icon Gordon Matthew Thomas Sumner, better known as Sting, performed to a sold-out crowd at Hard Rock Live in Gary Sunday night as part of his Sting 3.0 Tour.

The tour kicked off in Europe in May 2024 and the North American leg of the tour launched September 2024. A performance at the Auditorium Theatre in Chicago on Monday concluded his 2025 tour dates. The tour will continue in 2026 with dates in North America and Europe.

Two of his recent show dates were canceled on Nov. 10 and 11 in Florida due to a temporary throat infection. The Sting that showed up in Gary showed no signs of being under the weather. His voice strong, he held long, steady notes, strummed a guitar throughout the 1 hour and 50 minute set, and displayed energy not often seen by his peers.

At 74, he’s been performing professionally for five decades. In 1977, he joined with Stewart Copeland and Henry Padovani to form the band, The Police, which went on to create five chart-topping albums together and win six Grammy Awards. Sting continued his career as a solo artist starting in 1985 and went on to win more Grammys, amassing 17 in total. He has sold a combined total of more than 100 million records as a solo artist and as a member of the band.

The show opened with “Message in a Bottle,” the 1979 tune that became the band’s first No. 1 hit in the UK. It continued with a combination of Sting’s solo hits, including “If I Ever Lose My Faith in You” and “Fields of Gold” and some of the songs the band became best known for, like “King of Pain,” “Every Little Thing She Does is Magic” and “Wrapped Around Your Finger.”

Leading up to “Fields of Gold” Sting asked the crowd if they has been to Stonehenge (the prehistoric landmark in Wiltshire, England). He described the golden barley fields near his home similar to those described in the song.

“I live about a mile south of Stonehenge in a little country house,” he said. “Actually, it’s a castle, but stop by if you go to Stonehenge and I’ll make you a cup of tea.”

After heading off stage as the lights dimmed to a standing ovation following “Every Breath You Take,” the trio returned for a rousing rendition of “Roxanne,” a hit that in 2000 was ranked by VH1 as song No. 85 on its list of the “100 Greatest Rock Songs” and was named one of “The 500 Songs That Shaped Rock and Roll” by the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. After announcing that he was going to end the show with something “quiet and thoughtful,” he followed with the song “Fragile” off his 1987 solo album “Nothing Like the Sun.”

Absent of pyrotechnics (but with impressive lighting and video), a large band of musicians and back-up singers, the tour was scaled down for smaller, more intimate venues with the band comprised of a trio that also included longtime collaborator, guitarist Dominic Miller, a native of Argentina who he has worked with since 1990, and drummer Chris Maas, who has been a touring drummer with Mumford & Sons.

“The whole thing was wonderful, from the lighting to his performance,” said Peter Rokosz of Schererville. “His voice is still very strong. It was amazing.”

Geo Dimarca and his wife, Michelle, of Elmhurst have been longtime fans of Sting and saw an earlier show of the Sting 3.0 Tour during the 2024 at Chicago’s Auditorium Theatre. “It was phenomenal. For a guy that’s around 73-ish, he sounds just like he did back in the day,” he said. “We also saw him in 1999. He’s an icon of the 1980s and I don’t think a lot of people recognize that.”

(c) The Lansing Journal by Carrie Steinweg