In Cologne by Sandra Scherning & Martin Nickel

Sting guitarist finds long gig paying off

Dominic Miller has been Sting's guitar player for 15 years, longer than any other musician who has worked with the gentleman rocker. Longer, even, than Sting's former Police comrades.

"My day job," the 43-year-old Miller says, "is arguably the best day job a guitarist could ever dream of, playing in a big rock setting in big places with an incredible musician like Sting."

It is paying off in other ways. Last year, Miller released an album called Shapes in England that topped that country's classical charts for four weeks. It's not a classical album per se; it's more a collection of pop interpretations of classical pieces by Bach, Beethoven and other classical composers.

"It's pointless to do a classical record when I'm not a classical musician," explains the guitarist, who got help from friends Sting (who sings Shape of My Heart), Placido Domingo (who duets with Sting on Ave Maria) and trumpeter Chris Botti, who is touring as a member of Sting's band and is opening shows for Sting's Sacred Love tour.

Part of the trend of classical and pop music hybrids, dubbed "classical crossover," the CD will be released in the United States on Tuesday on the Decca label.

"Really, it's just music," Miller says humbly. "I've just been given this incredible opportunity to make a record with a budget and an orchestra and incredible musicians. I have no expectations for it in America at all. I just hope they dig it."

Born in Argentina and raised for a time in Racine, Wisc., before moving to London, Miller studied classical guitar for a year at England's esteemed Guildhall School of Music and Drama conservatory. He hated it.

"I wanted to make some money and be a professional musician," says Miller, who became a successful studio musician, recording with the likes of the Pretenders, Steve Winwood and Peter Gabriel.

Miller first worked with Sting in 1989 and first toured with him on the 1991 Soul Cages tour. He has played on every one of Sting's albums and tours since, including Sacred Love, his newest album, issued last year.

But Shapes marked the first time that Miller asked Sting to return the favour. "I've never called on Sting to help with my little causes... I think subconsciously I was waiting for a good opportunity to bring him in... I'd be lying if I said it wouldn't help my cause and the record company's cause," says Miller, who has released three other albums on small, independent labels, with a fifth, Third World, released this week in Europe.

It wasn't just a commercial move, he adds. The Shapes project is the direct result of a book of Bach sheet music Sting gave him during the Brand New Day tour in 1999. "I opened it up and started playing some of the pieces on the guitar," recalls the guitarist. "It became an obsession."

© The Flint Journal | February 2004

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