Hi guys!! Today i want to review a song that we all remember with that .
" Shape of My Heart " is a song by British musician Sting. It was released in August 1993 as the fifth single from the album Ten Summoner's Tales. The song was co-written by guitarist Dominic Miller. It was used for the end credits of the film Léon starring Jean Reno and Natalie Portman, and within the 1993 film Three of Hearts.
The song has become a pop classic and one of Sting's works most closely associated with his solo career. It currently has more than 140 million plays on the streaming platform Spotify.
Sting explained that through " Shape of My Heart " he wanted to tell the story of a " card player, a gambler who gambles not to win but to try to figure out something; to figure out some kind of mystical logic in luck, or chance; some kind of scientific, almost religious law."
Sting (from a 1993 promotional interview): I wanted to write about a card player, a gambler who gambles not to win but to try and figure out something; to figure out some kind of mystical logic in luck, or chance; some kind of scientific, almost religious law. So this guy's a philosopher, he's not playing for respect and he's not playing for money, he's just trying to figure out the law - there has to be some logic to it. He's a poker player so it's not easy for him to express his emotions, in fact he doesn't express anything, he has a mask, and it's just one mask and it never changes?
This is one of the rare songs that is co-written by Sting's longtime guitarist, Dominic Miller. In Lyrics By Sting, the singer remembered Miller bringing him the beautiful guitar riff and going for a walk along the riverbank and through the woods to figure out the lyrics. When I got back, the whole song was written in my head. Dominic now thinks that I find lyrics under a rock somewhere... He could, of course, be right,Sting wrote.
This song was edited into the end of the 1994 movie Leon: The Professional.
Both the Sugababes and Craig David sampled this and had hit singles with it in 2003 in the UK. The Sugababes Shape made #11, and Craig David's Rise And Fall made #2. On the latter, Sting even made an appearance in the video and performed the track with Craig David on live music shows.
15 years later, US rapper Juice WRLD had a worldwide hit with Lucid Dreams (Forget Me) which also makes major use of this track.
Renowned harmonica player Larry Adler played on this song. Before collaborating with popular musicians like Sting, Elton John and Kate Bush in his later career, Adler worked with composers like George Gershwin, Ralph Vaughan Williams, and Darius Milhaud - many of whom composed works specifically for him. Unfortunately, he would be blacklisted during the anti-Communist crusade led by Senator Joe McCarthy in the '50s
This was featured on the TV crime drama Hustle in the 2011 episode The Delivery.
Miller was just warming up his fingers by playing Chopin-style chords on the guitar when he happened to catch Sting's ear. He explained in a 2018 interview at Jazzklub Divino in Denmark: I was just playing that in front of the fireplace at Sting's house in England and he said, What's that?Oh, it's nothing, it's just a little movement. He said, That's a song.I went, Really? Are you kidding me? Then ten minutes later we went into the studio - cause we were at his studio anyway in his lake house - and we put a drum machine up, just the two of us. And then he went out in the garden for a walk and he came back with those lyrics. And so we recorded it! It was just an acoustic guitar and it was finished in one day - it was written in one day and recorded.
He continued: It's one of those nice moments that happen in your life when things just fall on top of each other naturally, like nature. It's not always like that... Sting's genius with lyrics made it into a very, very ambiguous kind of narrative, which really goes well with that kind of arpeggio, with those Chopin-esque chords, you know? That Chopin-esque harmony kind of lends itself to those kind of lyrics, with Sting's timbre of his voice and the sound of my guitar and just a little bit of a groove. It was the perfect storm.
More songs from Sting
“Shape of My Heart” is a song performed by English singer and songwriter Sting. Contrary to popular belief, this song isn’t a love song. In a 1993 interview, Sting said the lyrics of the track tell the story of a card player (a gambler/poker player) who plays cards or gambles not because he hopes to win but because he wants to “figure out something” eluding him. According to Sting, the gambler gambles mainly because he wants to understand “some kind of mystical logic in luck”.
Sting went on to refer to the gambler as a “philosopher” who gambles neither for respect nor for money but in the sole attempt to figure out the logic in chance or luck, which he refers to as a law that is to a certain degree scientific or even religious.
In describing the character of the gambler, Sting said that by virtue of the fact that he is a poker player, he doesn’t “express his emotions”. He wears a mask, which “never changes”.
n Sting’s 2007 book titled Lyrics by Sting, Sting said after receiving the song’s guitar riff from his longtime friend and guitarist Dominic Miller, he went out for a walk through the woods to try to think of the lyrics of the song and that by the time he returned, he had written the entire song in his head.
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The song was written by Sting and the noted Argentine-born guitarist Dominic Miller.Sting produced the track with English record producer Hugh Padgham, who is considered one of the most influential producers of his time. Padgham is best known for producing some of the most famous works of such bands and artists as Phil Collins, Genesis, David Bowie and The Police. He pioneered the legendary gated reverb drum sound which was used heavily on Phil Collins’ 1981 global hit song “In the Air Tonight“.“Shape of My Heart” was released on August 1st, 1993 as the 5th single from Sting’s fourth studio album Ten Summoner’s Tales, which sold over 10 million copies worldwide.The song, which has a total run time of 4 minutes and 41 seconds, peaked at number 57 on the UK Singles Chart.The late American harmonica player Larry Adler played the harmonica on the track.The song was played during the end credits of the 1994 thriller film Léon: The Professional starring French actor Jean Reno and Israeli-born American actress Natalie Portman.
Which artists have sampled “Shape of My Heart”?
A lot! Some of the most notable songs that contain prominent samples of this track include: the 2003 song “Shape” by the English girl group Sugababes, another 2003 song titled “Rise and Fall” by English singer Craig David and the 2018 song “Lucid Dreams” by American rapper Juice World. Some other popular songs that sample “Shape of My Heart” include the following
Lyric :
[Verse 1]
He deals the cards as a meditation
And those he plays never suspect
He doesn't play for the money he wins
He doesn't play for respect
He deals the cards to find the answer
The sacred geometry of chance
The hidden law of a probable outcome
The numbers lead a dance
[Chorus]
I know that the spades are the swords of a soldier
I know that the clubs are weapons of war
I know that diamonds mean money for this art
But that's not the shape of my heart
[Verse 2]
He may play the jack of diamonds
He may lay the queen of spades
He may conceal a king in his hand
While a memory of it fades
[Chorus]
I know that the spades are the swords of a soldier
I know that the clubs are weapons of war
I know that diamonds mean money for this art
But that's not the shape of my heart
[Bridge]
That's not the shape, shape of my heart
[Harmonica Solo]
[Verse 3]
And if I told you that I loved you
You'd maybe think there's something wrong
I'm not a man of too many faces
The mask I wear is one
But those who speak know nothing
And find out to their cost
Like those who curse their luck in too many places
And those who fear are lost
[Chorus]
I know that the spades are the swords of a soldier
I know that the clubs are weapons of war
I know that diamonds mean money for this art
But that's not the shape of my heart
That's not the shape of my heart
That's not the shape, the shape of my heart
Oh, one of my favourites by Sting (although I like all Sting songs) This one is special, probably because of the movie as well!
Jean Reno 💛