Ten Summoner's Tales is the fourth solo studio album by English musician Sting. Released in 1993, it explores themes of love and morality in a noticeably upbeat mood compared to his previous release, the introspective The Soul Cages, released in 1991 after the loss of both his parents in the 1980s. The album contains two US hits; "If I Ever Lose My Faith in You" reached No. 17 on the Billboard Hot 100 while "Fields of Gold" got to No. 23.[ allmusic]
Ten Summoner's Tales was shortlisted for the 1993 Mercury Prize. In 1994, it was nominated for six Grammy awards including Album of the Year (losing to Whitney Houston‘s The Bodyguard), winning Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical, Best Male Pop Vocal Performance ("If I Ever Lose My Faith in You") and Best Long Form Music Video, while "If I Ever Lose My Faith in You" was also nominated for Record and Song of the Year.
Recording Sting commented that he intended for the songs on Ten Summoner's Tales to be more upbeat than the material found on his previous studio album, The Soul Cages and that his goal was to write songs that would "amuse my band and family." The album was recorded at Lake House, Wiltshire, mixed at The Town House, London and mastered at Masterdisk, New York. The cover of the album was photographed at Wardour Castle in Wiltshire, featuring Hrímnir, an Icelandic horse Sting owned for a period. He bought the horse from his friend Ársæll Jónsson. The title is a combined pun of his family name, Sumner, and the summoner in Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales.
The second track on the album, "Love Is Stronger Than Justice (The Munificent Seven)", was named as a homage to the films Seven Samurai and The Magnificent Seven. According to the interview disc, the idea came to Sting when he wanted to write a song in the 7/4 time signature. The song "Seven Days" is also noted for the sophisticated playing of drummer Vinnie Colaiuta in the 5/4 time signature.
The singles for Ten Summoner's Tales give credit to Fernandes Guitars, as Dominic Miller played a Fernandes P-Project Acoustic Electric Nylon guitar throughout the album.
Unlike Sting's previous solo albums, Ten Summoner's Tales did not reach number one on the UK Albums Chart, being held off the top spot by Lenny Kravitz's Are You Gonna Go My Way upon its release. Ten Summoner's Tales remained in the top 20 for more than six months in the UK and achieved worldwide sales of 3 million by September 1993.
Releases
A long-form performance video of the entire album was filmed at Sting's Lake House property. The audio used is partly from the album and partly recorded as played by the band during the filming. This film was released in conjunction with the album on VHS and LaserDisc. The video went on to win a Grammy Award for Best Long Form Video in 1994, and was directed by Doug Nichol and produced by Julie Fong. A promotional disc was made where Sting discusses some of the songs on the album.
On 11 August 1994, a compact disc of Ten Summoner's Tales became the first item securely purchased over the Internet, for $12.48 plus shipping.
Remasters Ten Summoner's Tales was remastered and re-released in 1998. The new CD issue included a bonus video track of "If I Ever Lose My Faith in You". It also featured the song "Everybody Laughed But You", which was excluded from the original 1993 release in the US and Canada. The song did appear on the original release in the UK, Europe, Japan and other territories, and on the single "If I Ever Lose My Faith in You". The instrumental track for "Everybody Laughed But You" was also used with an alternate lyric and released as "January Stars" on the singles "Seven Days" and "If I Ever Lose My Faith in You".
In February 2023, Ten Summoner's Tales a digital-exclusive 30th anniversary deluxe edition was released, which included the original track listing and 15 bonus tracks.
Track listing
Notes:
"Everybody Laughed But You" does not appear on most vinyl pressings or on the original US and Canadian versions of the album. Pressings of the album that do not include "Everybody Laughed But You" (and so only have 11 tracks) omit "Prologue" from the title of "If I Ever Lose My Faith in You".
Personnel Sting – lead vocals, bass, double bass, harmonica, saxophone, arrangements David Sancious – keyboards Dominic Miller – guitars Paul Franklin – pedal steel guitar Vinnie Colaiuta – drums Larry Adler – chromatic harmonica Brendan Power – chromatic harmonica Richard Edwards – trombone Mark Nightingale – trombone John Barclay – trumpet Guy Barker – trumpet Dave Heath – flute Kathryn Tickell – Northumbrian smallpipes, fiddle Sian Bell – cello James Boyd – viola Simon Fischer – violin Kathryn Greeley – violin David Foxxe – narration
Production Produced by Hugh Padgham and Sting Engineered and mixed by Hugh Padgham Assistant engineer – Andrew Bradfield, Pete Lewis, Simon Osborne Digital editing – Roger Lian Mastered by Bob Ludwig at Masterdisk (New York) Technical assistant – Danny Quatrochi Photography – Kevin Westenberg Package design – Richard Frankel and Norman Moore
Accolades Grammy Awards
| style="width:35px; text-align:center;" rowspan="6"|1994 ||rowspan=3| Ten Summoner's Tales || Album of the Year || |- |Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical || |- |Best Music Video, Long Form || |- |rowspan=3|"If I Ever Lose My Faith in You" || Best Pop Vocal Performance, Male || |- | Record of the Year || |- | Song of the Year ||
Brit Awards
| width="35" align="center" rowspan="3"|1994||Ten Summoner's Tales || Best British Album || |- | Sting (performer) || Best British Male Artist || |- | "Fields of Gold" || Best British Video ||
Mercury Prize
| width="35" align="center"|1993 || Ten Summoner's Tales || Mercury Music Prize ||
Charts
Weekly charts Chart (1993)PeakpositionCanadian Albums (RPM)Library and Archives Canada. Retrieved 31 October 20113French Albums (SNEP)2Japanese Albums (Oricon)4
Year-end charts Chart (1993)PositionAustrian Albums (Ö3 Austria)25Canadian Albums (RPM)19Dutch Albums (Album Top 100)28French Albums (SNEP)18German Albums (Offizielle Top 100)14Japanese Albums (Oricon)101New Zealand Albums (RMNZ)23 Spanish Albums (AFYVE)20Swiss Albums (Schweizer Hitparade)28UK Albums (OCC)12US Billboard 20021
Certifications and sales
References
External links Stingoop.com Ten Summoner's Tales Release Details Sting.com Ten Summoner's Tales Release Details on Sting's official website