Coldplay and Sting call for release of Toomaj Salehi, Iranian rapper sentenced to death

Posted on May 9, 2024 by Admin

Leading cultural figures including Margaret Atwood sign statement in support of rapper who criticised Iranian regime

More than 100 figures from the worlds of music, culture and human rights activism – including Coldplay and Sting – have signed a statement calling for the release of the Iranian rapper Toomaj Salehi who has been sentenced to death in Iran after protesting in support of women’s rights.

The 33-year-old, who was a vocal supporter of the Women, Life, Freedom movement in Iran was sentenced to death by a court in the city of Isfahan on 24 April, according to his lawyer.

Admit women or we quit, Sting and Stephen Fry tell Garrick

Posted on April 30, 2024 by Admin

In letter ahead of vote, signatories including Mark Knopfler say relations with female colleagues have been damaged

The musicians Sting and Mark Knopfler have co-signed a letter with leading theatre producers and actors, warning that they will be obliged to resign their memberships of the men-only Garrick Club if members refuse to approve a decision to admit women in a vote next Tuesday.

The letter, seen by the Guardian, was also signed by the actor Stephen Fry, the West End and Broadway theatre producer Karl Sydow, and Matthew Byam Shaw, an executive producer on The Crown television series and co-founder of Playful West End theatre production company.

‘They have this ferocious loyalty’: Trudie Styler on the people of Naples

Posted on October 24, 2023 by Admin

Her new documentary, Posso Entrare? An Ode to Naples, explores the lives of residents in mafia-ridden backstreets

If people think of Trudie Styler and her association with Italy, they are most likely to conjure up an image of the wine-making estate she owns with her husband, Sting, in Tuscany.

Few people would know her as a woman raised on a council estate in the English Midlands who wandered through the labyrinthine, mafia-ridden backstreets of Naples for her latest documentary, Posso Entrare? An Ode to Naples, which draws on the lives of a host of city residents.

The documentary starts in the evocative Sanità district, where Styler meets Antonio Loffredo, a priest transforming the lives of young people who might otherwise have fallen prey to the Camorra mafia organisation, and where she visits multigenerational families living in case bassi – ground-floor homes that usually have just one room – and a door opening on to the street that provides the only source of air and light.

Sting sells back catalogue to Universal Music in deal worth up to $300m

Posted on February 10, 2022 by Admin

Musician becomes latest big name to cash in on a long and successful career

Sting has sold his back catalogue, featuring hits including Roxanne, Every Breath You Take and Englishman in New York, to Universal Music in a deal thought to be worth up to $300m (£221m).

The 70-year old, who found global fame as a member of the Police in the late 1970s and early 80s before going solo, becomes the latest big name musician to cash in on a long and successful career.