SAN DIEGO — The world premiere of Rock & Roll Hall of Famer Stewart Copeland’s “Police Deranged for Orchestra” with the San Diego Symphony on Friday marked a full-circle moment for the star drummer-turned-composer.
In 1971, at the age of 19, the Virginia-born, Lebanon-raised Copeland moved to San Diego from London after completing his first year of college in England. He enrolled at California Western University — which was located on the campus of what is now Point Loma Nazarene University — and also studied at downtown’s School of Performing Arts.
“I lived at the end of Del Monte Street in Ocean Beach and played music with friends at keggers and school parties,” Copeland, 69, recalled. “I’d love to say I was surfing off Point Loma, but the Pacific Ocean is rough compared to the Mediterranean!”
He credits his music composition teacher here, Dr. Mary K. Phillips, with starting him on a road that — post-The Police — has seen him write numerous orchestral film scores, concertos, operas and at least one ballet. His first film score, for the Francis Ford Coppola-directed “Rumble Fish,” earned him a 1984 Golden Globe nomination.
“Opera is where I’m really headed, because that’s the most fun a composer can have with their clothes on,” Copeland, a five-time Grammy Award winner, said by phone on Aug. 16 from his Los Angeles home.
“I had a new opera that was set to debut in 2020 and another that was set to debut in 2021, but they both got pushed back a year because of the pandemic. After my San Diego concert, I will go directly to the city of Weimar, Germany, where my opera ‘Electric Saint’ — based on the real-life rivalry between Nikola Tesla and Thomas Edison — will open in September.”
Reinventing The Police’s music
But first comes “Police Deranged for Orchestra.” Its pending world premiere at the San Diego Symphony’s new $85 million Rady Shell at Jacobs Park had Copeland sounding giddy with excitement, both about the music and the venue.
“I’ve been all over Rady Shell, online, and I can’t wait to get there in person,” he said ahead of the show.
“Before I go to play a show, I first Google Map it in 3D and ‘walk the streets,’ so to speak. Unfortunately, Rady Shell is so new, it’s not in Google Maps yet. If you Google it, it comes up as a field. It’s a fantastic venue. Venues like that are the reason we play music.”
Copeland formed The Police with bassist-singer Sting in 1977. The trio’s original guitarist was replaced later that year by Andy Summers. By the early 1980s, the band had become one of the biggest rock acts in the world — and one of the most imaginative and forward-looking.
The Police imploded by 1984, then reunited for three stadium shows in 1986. The group did not perform again until a reunion tour in 2007 and 2008.
Sting and Summers are proud of their work in The Police, whose worldwide album sales stand at 75 million. Copeland, who rates the prospects of another reunion at no more than “3 percent,” is eager to breathe new life into the trio’s repertoire.
He first did so with his 2006 film documentary, “Everyone Stares: The Police Inside Out.” For its soundtrack, he combined studio and live recordings of Police favorites to add new twists to familiar songs.
“I digitized 52 hours of our music and then carved them up with a scalpel,” he explained. “I ended up with seven ‘deranged’ Police tunes, where I not only messed with the form of the songs but I found lost guitar licks, solos and alternate vocals vocals and harmonies by Sting. Then, I re-arranged everything using (the digital audio workstation) Pro Tools.
“That brings us to this orchestral concert, which was inspired by my 2019 tour of Germany, ‘Lights Up the Orchestra,’ which featured some of my film scores and some Police songs. For ‘Police Deranged for Orchestra,’ half the songs will be ‘deranged,’ which I did all the orchestrations for, and the other half will be the original arrangements, which I also orchestrated.”
Prince meets Paul McCartney
Friday’s concert featured the San Diego Symphony playing with Copeland on drums, veteran Paul McCartney band guitarist Rusty Anderson, bass virtuoso Armand Sabal-Lecco and three singers — Ashley Tamar (best known for her work with Prince), Carmel Helene and Amy Keys.
Together, they performed a combination of Police hits and deep album cuts with appeal to casual and devoted fans alike. “When music has a nostalgic connection to it, there’s an emotional surge for the audience and the artist,” said Copeland, who was featured as a composer and performer at the 2009 edition of La Jolla Music Society’s SummerFest.
“For a Mahler concert, the audience should sit quietly, listen and shut the (expletive) up. But this is different. This a celebration. And if everybody who attends dances on tables and throws popcorn, that’s a good thing!”
In the heat of the moment in his touring days with The Police, Copeland combined impressive technical skill with a tempo-accelerating enthusiasm that sometimes annoyed Sting.
Does Copeland have to temper his playing style when teamed with an orchestra, both in terms of dynamics and tempos, and because the orchestra can’t suddenly respond to a drum fill or other spontaneous, in-the-moment musical occurrences?
“Actually, they can adjust,” he replied. “That part is doable. The conductor and I work very closely, because I follow him. He establishes (the tempos) and I try and stay with him, because the orchestra is following him. But if I start to push it, he listens to me also. And since I’m dominating the aural spectrum, he follows me.
“But, as far as volume, I have to completely revamp the drumming I do with a rock band when I play with an orchestra. At the first rehearsal I did with the Seattle Symphony, everyone said: ‘We can’t hear the orchestra at all!’ I said: ‘Let me play it really quietly.’ It’s been a long road and I’ve had to figure it out and there are all kinds of great benefits from (me) playing (softer).
“To be able to improvise while the orchestra is playing in such a rock solid manner means I can take it to different places in my playing. I can push it up, pull it back, go under it and land right on it.”
