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All Music Guide:
While Andy Summers is best known as the guitarist of the Police, he has since forged a successful and acclaimed solo career with new age-influenced contemporary instrumental music that, like his work with Sting and company, draws on his love for jazz and his fascination with creating instrumental textures. Born Andrew James Somers in Poulton-Fylde, Lancashire, England, on December 31, 1942, the young Somers (who later changed his surname to the more easily spelled Summers) moved to Bournemouth as a child and, upon taking up the guitar at 14, immersed himself in the local jazz scene. By 16, he was playing in local clubs and coffeehouses, where he was noticed by Zoot Money. Somers was invited to join Money's Big Roll Band, with whom he appeared on the live album The All Happening Zoot Money's Big Roll Band at Klook's Kleek. Money eventually changed the band into a psychedelic outfit called Dantalian's Chariot, and when that project dissolved in early 1968, Somers briefly signed on with the Soft Machine before rejoining Money in a revamped Animals lineup for the LP Love Is. When that imploded in 1969, Somers studied classical guitar and composition at UCLA for four years, in the meantime giving guitar lessons, gigging with a local Latin-rock band, and acting with various theater troupes. Upon his return to England in 1973, Summers became something of a journeyman, touring in the backing bands of Neil Sedaka, Kevin Coyne, Kevin Ayers, and David Essex.
Summers met Sting and Stewart Copeland in 1977 while playing with a band called Strontium 90. The two asked Summers to join their full-time project, the Police; together, the trio gradually developed a style centered around jazz- and reggae-influenced pop/rock, and Sting's strong bass lines allowed Summers to supply subtle sonic textures and colors on his guitar, and to experiment with various effects. Summers first stepped out on his own in 1982, teaming with King Crimson guitarist Robert Fripp on the jazz- and Eastern-tinged I Advance Masked. It was followed in 1984 with Bewitched, another Summers/Fripp collaboration, around the same time the Police officially disbanded.
Eager to establish himself in musical realms outside of rock & roll, Summers did a bit of movie soundtrack work (Down and Out in Beverly Hills, 2010, etc.) before returning to recording, this time on his own. His first solo effort, 1987's harmonically intricate yet pop-oriented XYZ, met with poor critical response. Its follow-up, 1988's Mysterious Barricades, was more successful, emphasizing Summers' textural sensibilities on its jazzy, new age-influenced compositions. A string of albums in this style followed through the '90s, notably The Golden Wire (1989), Charming Snakes (1991), World Gone Strange (1991), Invisible Thread (1993), and The Last Dance of Mr. X (1997). For 1998's Strings of Desire, he teamed with South American guitar virtuoso Victor Biglione; 1999's Green Chimneys: Music of Thelonious Monk found Summers working with a larger ensemble than usual for him, as well as his first collaboration with Sting since the Police (on a version of "'Round Midnight"). Following the success of his Monk-themed album, the guitarist put together an album of interpretations of compositions by Charles Mingus called Peggy's Blue Skylight, released in late 2000. Earth + Sky appeared four years later. Summers continued to record thereafter, releasing First You Build a Cloud in 2007. He also participated in the Police reunion tour that same year.
Wikipedia:
Andrew James "Andy" Summers (born 31 December 1942) is an English guitarist born in Poulton-le-Fylde, Lancashire, England. Best known as the guitarist for rock band The Police, he has also recorded twelve solo albums, collaborated with many other artists, toured extensively under his own name, published several books, and composed several film scores.
Name
His birth name is Andrew James Summers. For a brief two-year period, Summers spelled his name Somers, but subsequently reverted to using his real family name Summers.
Early life
During his early childhood, his family moved to Bournemouth in the county of Dorset. After years of piano lessons, he took up the guitar at the age of thirteen. By age sixteen he was playing in local clubs. By nineteen, he had moved to London with his friend Zoot Money to form Zoot Money's Big Roll Band.
Musical career
Pre-Police career
Summers' professional career began in the mid 1960s in London as the guitarist for the British rhythm and blues band Zoot Money's Big Roll Band, which eventually came under the influence of the spreading psychedelic scene and morphed into the acid rock group Dantalian's Chariot. After the demise of Dantalion's Chariot, Summers joined The Soft Machine for a period of six months and toured the United States. For a brief time in 1968, he was a member of The Animals, then known as Eric Burdon and the Animals, with whom he recorded one album, Love Is. The album features a recording of Traffic's "Coloured Rain", which includes a guitar solo by Summers that runs a full 4 minutes and 15 seconds.
After a period of five years in Los Angeles, mostly spent at California State University Northridge in the Los Angeles suburbs, he returned to London with his American girlfriend Kate Lunken. Back in London, Summers recorded and toured with a number of acts, including Kevin Coyne, Jon Lord, Tim Essex, Neil Sedaka and Kevin Ayers. In 1975 he participated in an orchestral rendition of Mike Oldfield seminal piece Tubular Bells.
In 1977, Summers was invited by ex-Gong bassist Mike Howlett to join his band Strontium 90, along with future Police mates Sting and Stewart Copeland.
The Police (1977-1984)
Summers achieved international fame as the guitarist for The Police, which he joined in 1977. Emerging from London’s punk scene, the Police gained international fame with many hit songs, including "Message in a Bottle", "Roxanne", "Don't Stand So Close to Me", "Every Breath You Take", and "Every Little Thing She Does is Magic". During his tenure with the band, Summers twice won the Grammy Award for Best Rock Instrumental Performance, first with "Regatta de Blanc" (co-authored with Copeland and Sting in 1979), and then with his song "Behind My Camel" in 1980. Although Sting was the lead vocalist of the band, Summers occasionally contributed lead vocals, as with "Be My Girl - Sally" (1978), "Friends" (1980), "Mother" (1983) and "Someone to Talk to" (1983). Other notable Summers' compositions from this period are "Omega Man" (which would have been released as the debut single from the 1981 "Ghost in the Machine" album if Sting had not objected), "Shambelle" (1981) and "Murder by Numbers" (1983). In early 1984, after seven years and record sales around eighty million, the Police disbanded.
Post-Police (1984-2007)
Summers' solo career has included touring, recording, composing for films (including 2010, Down and Out in Beverly Hills and Weekend at Bernie's), writing books, and exhibiting his photography. In 1992, he served a brief stint as Musical Director on the short-lived Dennis Miller Show.
Summers' solo debut, "XYZ" was released in 1986, and to this day is the only non-instrumental album in his entire catalogue. Although it featured some fine pop material, including the single "Love is the strangest Way", it failed to dent the charts, prompting Summers to move from MCA to Private Music and embrace a more experimental sound. In 1987 Sting invited Summers to perform on his second album "Nothing Like the Sun", a favor the singer returned by playing bass on "Charming Snakes" (1990) and later contributing vocals to "Round Midnight" in Summers' tribute album to Thelonious Monk "Green Chimneys" (1999). In the mid-1990s Summers briefly returned to a more rock-oriented sound with "Synathestesia" (1995) and "The Last Dance Of Mr X" (1997), before recording a string of jazz albums that highlighted his eclectic guitar talent.
Over the years Summers has contributed with a number of fellow-guitarists, including Robert Fripp, John Etheridge, Victor Biglione and Benjamin Verdery. In December 2004 he and Copeland joined Incubus in Los Angeles and performed "Roxanne" and "Message in a Bottle". In March 2005, he made his debut at Carnegie Hall playing the premier of Dark Florescense, a concerto composed for him and Verdery. His 2006 biography One Train Later was voted music book of the year in the UK’s Mojo magazine, and is to be released as a documentary film in 2011 by Yari pictures.
The Police Reunion (2007–2008)
On the 2007 Grammys Award show, The Police appeared playing "Roxanne" and subsequently announced that they would be going on tour. The Police Reunion tour began in Vancouver, Canada on 28 May 2007, and continued until August 2008 becoming the third highest grossing tour of all time.
Awards
He was voted number one pop guitarist for five years in Guitar Player Magazine before being inducted into the Guitar Player Hall of Fame. In 2003, along with his band mates Sting and Stewart Copeland he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
In 2008, he was awarded an honorary doctorate by Bournemouth University.
Summers was appointed, by the French Government, a Chevalier of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 2007.
Producer career
In 2012, Summers will produce the third solo album from Brazilian singer Fernanda Takai.
