‘Always something to see’: Shaggy and Sting bring One Fine Day to the Mann

As one story goes, the musician Sting was on stage singing the famous “Roxanne” when another person jumped up on stage and joined in with the band.

That chance meeting, so the story sometimes goes, led to the pairing of Sting and Shaggy, a reggae/dancehall music star. They soon recorded the album “44/876” to Grammy-winning glory in 2019.

“We were playing this thing called ‘Night of The Proms,’ ” said Shaggy from his home in Jamaica about the 2004 music festival in Belgium. “We had a night off and saw Sting was playing nearby. We struck up a conversation and he said ‘Why don’t you come up during Roxanne?’ I wasn’t going to say no, so I jumped up there.”

While the story of their “chance” meeting may be a bit more Hollywood than the actual one, the first time on stage has led to a musical collaboration still going today.

Sting and Shaggy are co-headlining the One Fine Day Festival, a full day of eclectic music featuring a diverse artist lineup — Thundercat, Koffee, Tank and the Bangas, Philly’s own G. Love & Special Sauce, Kes, Flor de Toloache, and French/ Italian sensation, Giordana Angi — across two stages at the The Mann, Sept. 9.

Sting & Shaggy will perform their biggest hits together, trading off and collaborating on “Every Breath You Take,” “Englishman In New York,” “Message In A Bottle,” “It Wasn’t Me,” “Boombastic” and “Angel” and more.

Tickets are available at https://manncenter.org/events/2023-09-09/one-fine-day

“Us being together on stage normally takes a lot of time because we have all this catalog to go through between Sting and me,” Shaggy said. “The way we intertwine the songs together, you know, where you’d find him singing (the Shaggy song) “It Wasn’t Me” and Sting sounds like an angel.

Then we’ll break into (the Police song) “Every Breath You Take” and all his other great songs. The interaction with him and me on stage is always something to see.”

Shaggy, who was born Orville Richard Burrell in Jamaica, grew up listening to reggae, dance hall music and, of all bands, the Sting-lead Police.

“Here in Jamaica from (reggae artist) Dennis Brown and all of these great reggae artists, they got played on the radio,” said Shaggy. “You know one real foreign act always got played was the Police. So, we’ve been hearing ‘Roxanne’ and these records on radio. For me, it was part of growing up.”

A lot of the early Police songs were written in Jamaica and have a distinct reggae undertone, so Shaggy always knew this collaboration would be a great fit. It took a little bit of time to get it all together, though.

“I hadn’t really seen Sting in a few years,” Shaggy said. “I had this song ‘Don’t Make Me Wait.’ I was in the studio in LA and he came in singing it and said ‘Let’s do this.’

“It really was nerve-wracking. Here is this giant of a man. This is Sting, my God, you know, but he was so down to earth and that session ended up being more of a fun session than work session. Then I realized that I had the brother I never knew I needed.”

Shaggy is coming off his summer tour where he played with TLC and En Vogue.

Still, he doesn’t need the rest and wants to get back on stage.

“We’ll probably do a run-through before the show,” said Shaggy. “It’s two bands together, so it’s my band and Sting’s band. We swap songs and they all know his material or our material, so I think, by the time we do one rehearsal.”

Then it’s just waiting for the show to begin.

“We will get up in the morning and we have an espresso,” said Shaggy. “Halfway through the day we’re, we’re, we’re at the spa. And we might take one of these long walks because he likes these really long walks.

“We’ll probably stop again and, you know, have some lunch. We are there with a song check and we’ll probably sit there and, and do planks and yoga. Then we’ll go on stage and then right after that we go straight in the van and then I’ll probably meet him at the bar right before we go to bed after the show.”