Music
Sting
Singer and bassist of the Police, solo artist
Born 1951
Photo: Raph_PH · CC BY 2.0
«I'd rather be a bad poet than a good clerk.»
Sting has won seventeen Grammy Awards with the Police and as a solo artist, writing Roxanne, Every Breath You Take and Fields of Gold. Before music he trained as a teacher and taught in a primary school.
Key achievements
- Seventeen Grammy Awards with the Police and solo
- Wrote Roxanne, Every Breath You Take and Fields of Gold
- Qualified as a teacher in 1973 and taught for two years
Universities
Coventry, West Midlands
Enrolled in 1969 straight after grammar school and left after a single term, later returning to receive an honorary doctorate.
Facts
- He got his nickname from a black and yellow striped jumper that made a bandmate say he looked like a bee.
- He taught at a primary school in Northumberland for two years while playing in jazz bands at night.
- Every Breath You Take is frequently played at weddings despite being a song about surveillance and obsession, which he finds funny.
Photographs
Photographs come from Wikimedia Commons under free licences; the author and licence are shown on each image.