Sting has been around for more than four decades, going back to his days with The Police, and he has been a solo act for more than three, but many people still don't know his real name. (It is Gordon Sumner.)
Likewise, many people are, sadly, unfamiliar with Geoffrey Chaucer's "The Canterbury Tales," a collection of stories told by a group of 14th–century pilgrims traveling from London to Canterbury to visit St. Thomas Becket's shrine at Canterbury Cathedral. One of those pilgrims was called The Summoner.
The title of Sting's album that was released 25 years ago today, "Ten Summoner's Tales," was a somewhat strained pun on both Sting's surname and the name of that character from "The Canterbury Tales."
The music was a nice change of pace for Sting, whose previous efforts had been largely influenced by the deaths of his parents. "Ten Summoner's Tales" was more upbeat. Of course, it wouldn't have taken much, given how somber those other albums had been.
The title of the album also made it clear that it was made with no concept in mind — and, after hearing it, the listener had no choice but to concede that point — with the exception of the fact that the songs tended to affirm love and morality.
Of the six singles that were released from the album, my favorite has long been "If I Ever Lose My Faith in You," but I have never spoken of the reason for that until now.
I had heard singles from the album on the radio, but I didn't really listen to the album until two years after it hit the record stores — the summer after my mother died in a flash flood. My father was disabled in that flood. It was a devastating time for the entire family.
My mother's childhood friend, Jane, checked in on my family on a regular basis that summer, making sure we were all functioning, still putting one foot in front of the other and not forgetting to breathe, and I remember buying the CD one day, mostly on a whim.
I put it in the CD player in my car and started listening to it as I drove home. "If I Ever Lose My Faith in You" was the first song that played. I had heard it before, but on that occasion all I could think of was how lost my family would have been without Jane that summer.
I suppose I will always think of her whenever I hear "If I Ever Lose My Faith in You." The song spoke the truth. If I ever lost my faith in Jane, there really would be nothing left for me to do.
The other single from the CD that I like is "Fields of Gold." While "If I Ever Lose My Faith in You" is a pop song, "Fields of Gold" is really more of a ballad.
Both songs were written by Sting and deserve to be designated as classics on an album that really didn't have many classic songs, but it was more than the sum of its parts.
It had classic contributors — most notably Eric Clapton, who didn't perform on the album but co–wrote "It's Probaby Me" with Sting.
It was the first single to be released from the album, but it was overshadowed by those other two songs.
It is probaby Sting's best album.
