SINGER Tina Turner, whose soul classics and pop hits like The Best and What’s Love Got to Do With It made her a superstar, has died at the age of 83.
Turner had suffered a number of health issues in recent years including cancer, a stroke and kidney failure.
She rose to fame alongside husband Ike in the 1960s with songs including Proud Mary and River Deep, Mountain High.
She divorced the abusive Ike in 1978, and went on to find even greater success as a solo artist in the 1980s.
Dubbed the Queen of Rock ‘n’ Roll, Tina Turner was famed for her raunchy and energetic stage performances and husky, powerful vocals.
She won eight Grammy Awards and was inducted into the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame in 2021 as a solo artist, having first been inducted alongside Ike Turner in 1991.
Upon her solo induction, the Hall of Fame noted how she had “expanded the once-limited idea of how a Black woman could conquer a stage and be both a powerhouse and a multidimensional being”.
Younger stars who have felt her influence include Beyonce, Janet Jackson, Janelle Monae and Rihanna.
Tina Turner in 1969
Born in Tennessee into a sharecropping family, she first found prominence as one of the backing singers for her husband’s band The Kings of Rhythm.
She soon went to to front the band, and the couple tasted commercial success with Fool in Love and It’s Gonna Work Out Fine, which made the US charts in the early 60s.
Their other hits included 1973’s Nutbush City Limits, about the small town where Tina was born. But Ike’s physical and emotional abuse was taking its toll.
It was he who changed her name from her birth name, Anna Mae Bullock, to Tina Turner – a decision he took without her knowledge, one example of his controlling behaviour.
BBC