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I just listened to a few cuts of this disc at Rhapsody. I actually find much admirable about it. Sting relates to the music in a more vernacular, modern manner than in the strictly academic manner in which I've usually heard this music.
Sting doesn't play the lute. That's Edin Karamazov. He gets some beautiful solo space.
I figured I'd play one cut and go to bed. But one cut became the next cut and the next became the next (oops, I guess they call them "tracks" not "cuts" now). I've listened to at least half the disc and I'm drawn to it.
My acquaintance with these songs is hearing them sung at the college by visiting, resident, and student vocalists. The songs are very beautiful, but they are often presented in a very formal manner. Sometimes that formal manner suppresses the innate emotion of the songs.
What grabbed me about Sting's versions is that Sting (to me) makes the emotion of the poetry come alive by his modern phrasing and individual enunciation of these ancient lines. To me, approaching this music as pop music brings some organic life back to it. He's respectful of it and obviously did his homework.
But then again, I'm not as vehemently anti-Sting as most folks 'round these parts. I like him.
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