By Ahmet Abdulaziz…..
For some time, I have developed a special liking for “The Police” music group. I frequently listen to their music.
“The Police” is an English rock band, formed in 1977 in London. They perhaps produced their best music during the 1980s and 1990s.
The important thing about any musical band is the harmony among the members of the band. I believe of course, with some exceptions, the more the original members of any band continue, the quality of their music improves constantly. In other words, any band which keeps on changing the members, find it really difficult to develop the needed harmony to produce good music.
“The Police”, is comprised of Sting, the songwriter, singer and bass guitarist, Andy Summers, the guitarist, and Stewart Copeland, the drummer, the three have brought to light some very remarkable songs.
To their credit, there are many popular songs but here I am more interested in mentioning “I am an Englishman in New York”, which is one of my favourite songs. Sung by Sting, the song was first released in 1987. It was re-released in 1990 with some different instrumentation. Sting re-recorded the song in an orchestral version for his album “Symphonicities”, in 2010.
I love this song very much, but whenever I listen to it my mind instantly goes to “New York, New York”, sung by Frank Sinatra. Sung in his own style of singing, I always find it difficult to pitch one against the other.
The song “New York New York”, is a comparatively old song, and has been sung by many popular singers, with variations. However, I always like the one by Frank Sinatra. The masculine voice of Sinatra, coupled with the music of the 1940s, makes it an unforgettable song for all times. At least for me it is so.
The two songs, one sung by Sting and the other by Frank Sinatra, are totally different from each other. Both of them deal with totally different topics and feelings. The only thing that’s common in the two is New York only. The words of the song, the music, the tune, the instrumentation, the periods, totally differ from each other.
But in my mind, these two songs are inseparable from each other. Whenever I listen to one, the other one follows instantly, making it almost impossible for me to find out the best of the two. For me, both are the best and inseparable.
So here are both of these two wonderful songs. I hope you will like them.
