Tina Turner, rock icon and the Queen of Rock ‘n’ Roll has died at the age of 83 after a long illness.
Her manager posted a statement on Facebook saying, “It is with great sadness that we announce the passing of Tina Turner. With her music and her boundless passion for life, she enchanted millions of fans around the world and inspired the stars of tomorrow. Today we say goodbye to a dear friend who leaves us all her greatest work: her music. All our heartfelt compassion goes out to her family. Tina, we will miss you dearly.”
Over the years, Turner had battled a number of health issues including intestinal cancer in 2016 and undergoing a kidney transplant in 2017.
LATF’s CEO and publisher, Michele Elyzabeth moved to the United States from France while working with Ike and Tina Turner in 1971.
“She was a remarkable lady who had a very rough life. She was very instrumental in giving others strength and courage. She defied the odds in choosing Rock ‘n’ Roll. She stuck with it and eventually became the Queen of it,” said Elyzabeth.
Born Anna Mae Bullock on November 26, 1939 in Brownsville, Tennessee, Turner was born into a sharecropping family in rural Tennessee. She began singing as a teenager and, after moving to St. Louis, Missouri, immersed herself in the local rhythm-and-blues scene.
She met Ike Turner at a performance by his band, the Kings of Rhythm, in 1956, and soon became part of the act. She began performing as Tina Turner, and her electric stage presence quickly made her the centrepiece of the show. The ensemble, which toured as the Ike and Tina Turner Revue, was renowned for its live performances but struggled to find recording success. That changed in 1960, when “A Fool in Love” hit the pop charts, and a string of hit singles followed.
Ike and Tina were married around the year 1962. Ike and Tina’s final hits as a couple were the cover version of Creedence Clearwater Revival’s “Proud Mary” (1971) and “Nutbush City Limits” (1973). Tina divorced Ike in 1978, alleging years of physical abuse and infidelity.
After a series of guest appearances on the albums of other artists, she released her debut solo album, Private Dancer, in 1984. She sold more than 20 million copies worldwide and won three Grammy Awards, including record of the year and best female vocal performance for “What’s Love Got to Do with It.”
Turner eventually moved to Switzerland and became a Swiss citizen in 2013. She wrote the autobiographies I, Tina (1986; written with Kurt Loder and adapted in 1993 as the film What’s Love Got to Do with It) and My Love Story (2018) as well as the self-help book Happiness Becomes You: A Guide to Changing Your Life for Good (2020; written with Taro Gold and Regula Curti). Ike and Tina were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1991. In addition to receiving a Kennedy Center Honor (2005), Tina was given a Grammy Award for lifetime achievement in 2018. That year same Tina, a jukebox musical based on her life and directed by Phyllida Lloyd, opened in London’s West End. The musical debuted on Broadway in 2019.
In 2021, HBO released a documentary about Turner’s life. TINA is a revealing and intimate look at the life and career of the musical icon, charting her improbable rise to early fame, her personal and professional struggles throughout her life and her even more improbable resurgence as a global phenomenon in the 1980s.
