Stewart Copeland @ Benaroya Hall

September 14th • 7:30 pm

Stewart Copeland has been a solo performer (as the late 70s cult act “Klark Kent”), a record producer, composed soundtracks for films and video games, and played with the likes of The Doors, Peter Gabriel, guitarist Adrian Belew, and jazz bassist Stanley Clarke. But he’ll always be best known as the drummer for post-punk new wavers, The Police, who reached mainstream heights during the 1980s.

Police Deranged gives the band’s work a classical spin, pairing Copeland with the Seattle Symphony and guest vocalists (all female in earlier iterations of this show) and rock musicians. Copeland’s Police bandmate Sting pursued a similar path in his 2010 Symphonicity Tour, when he performed with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. But whereas Sting’s show was split between Police numbers and his solo work, Police Deranged focuses almost entirely on the group’s songs (earlier performances have also included some of Copeland’s soundtrack work). So you can expect to hear such signature numbers as “Roxanne,” “Message in a Bottle,” “Don’t Stand So Close to Me,” and “Every Breath You Take,” along with deeper cuts like “Demolition Man” (written by Sting and first released as a single by Grace Jones). Copeland, playing drums, also shares behind-the-scenes stories about the songs, and takes a turn at conducting the orchestra himself.

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