Gordon Matthew Thomas Sumner, CBE (born October 2, 1951), universally known by his stage name Sting, is an Academy Award-nominated sixteen time Grammy-winning English musician from Wallsend in North Tyneside. Prior to starting his solo career, he was the principal songwriter, lead singer and bass guitar player of the rock band The Police. As a solo musician and member of The Police, Sting has sold over 45 million records[1], and received over sixteen Grammy Awards for his work, receiving his first Grammy for Best Rock Instrumental Performance in 1981, and receiving an Oscar nomination for best song.

Sting has stated that he gained his nickname while with the Phoenix Jazzmen. He once performed wearing a black and yellow sweater with hooped stripes that bandleader Gordon Solomon had noted made him look like a bumblebee; thus Sumner became "Sting". He uses Sting almost exclusively, except on official documents. In a press conference filmed in the movie Bring on the Night, he jokingly stated when referred to by a journalist as Gordon, "My children call me Sting, my mother calls me Sting, who is this Gordon character?".

Activism:
While with the Police, Sting wrote "Driven to Tears", an angry indictment of apathy in the face of world hunger, and it preceded his work on Sir Bob Geldof's "Feed The World" project. Sting sang on "Do They Know It's Christmas?" -- a hit single from Geldof's pop music super-group called "Band Aid" which eventually led to the Live Aid Concert in July 1985, in which Sting also took part, performing with Branford Marsalis, Phil Collins, and with the group Dire Straits.

Throughout the 1980s, Sting strongly supported environmentalism and humanitarian movements, such as Amnesty International. In 1986 he was interviewed by the BBC about the origins of his support for Amnesty International and he stated: "I've been a member of Amnesty and a support member for five years, due to an entertainment event called The Secret Policeman's Ball and before that I did not know about Amnesty, I did not know about its work, I did not know about torture in the world."

Sting's first involvement in the human rights cause occurred in September 1981 when he was invited by producer Martin Lewis to participate in the fourth Amnesty International gala The Secret Policeman's Other Ball following the example set at the 1979 show by Pete Townshend. Sting performed two of his Police compositions as a soloist - "Roxanne" and "Message in a Bottle"' - appearing on all four nights of the show at the Theatre Royal in London. Sting also led an impromptu super-group of other musicians (dubbed The Secret Police) performing at the show including Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, Phil Collins, Donovan, Bob Geldof and Midge Ure in the show's grand finale - Sting's own reggae-tinged arrangement of Bob Dylan's I Shall Be Released. The event was the first time that Sting had worked with Geldof, Collins and Ure - an association that developed further with 1984's Band Aid and 1985's Live Aid. Sting's performance - his first live appearances as a solo performer - was prominently featured on the album of the show (being its lead tracks) and in the film. In 1986, Sting was one of the headline performers on Amnesty's A Conspiracy of Hope tour of the US. In late 1986, Sting visited Quentin Crisp in his New York City apartment and learned about what it was like for Crisp to grow up gay in the homophobic 1920s - 1960s. As a result, Sting dedicated the song "Englishman In New York" to Crisp.

The summit of his many contributions to the human-rights cause came in 1988, when he joined a team of other major musicians - including Peter Gabriel and Bruce Springsteen - assembled under the banner of Amnesty International for the six-week world tour Human Rights Now! Tour celebrating the 40th anniversary of the signing of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

In 1988, he released the single "They Dance Alone" which chronicled the plight of the mothers, wives and daughters of the "disappeared", the innocent victims of the Pinochet regime in Chile. Unable to publicly voice their grievances to the government about their missing loved ones, for fear that they would "go missing" too, the women of Chile would pin photos of their "disappeared" relatives on their clothing, and dance in silent outrage against the government in public places.

With his wife Trudie Styler and Raoni Metuktire, a Kayapó Indian leader in Brazil, Sting founded the Rainforest Foundation to help save the rainforests. His support for these causes continues to this day, and includes an annual benefit concert held at New York's Carnegie Hall with Billy Joel, Elton John, James Taylor and other music superstars. A species of Colombian tree frog, Dendropsophus stingi, was named after him in recognition of his "commitment and efforts to save the rain forest" (Kaplan 1994).

Sting and his wife Trudie Styler were awarded the Peace Abbey Courage of Conscience award in Sherborn Mass on June 30, 2000. Singer/song writer, documentary film producers for their commitment to the environment through the establishment of the Rainforest Foundation; to human rights in China through the documentary film on Tiananmen Square; and to peace and social justice through the powerful gift of song.

In the early 1990s, Sting performed with Don Henley and Billy Joel in New York's Madison Square Garden at The Concert for Walden Woods. He also took part in the post-9-11 rock telethon to raise money for the families of the victims of terror attacks in the United States, and performed at the Live 8 concert, the follow up to 1985's Live Aid Concert.

Sting is known to support cannabis reclassification in the United Kingdom. Following Tony Blair's intention to revoke the rescheduling of cannabis executed in January 2006, he has joined a list of prominent figures who have written to the Prime Minister urging him to keep cannabis as a class C drug.

Visit www.sting.com for more information.