Tina Turner

Tina Turner was an icon of rock and R&B, with a string of major comebacks to her credit. She was born Anna Mae Bullock in Brownsville, TN, and grew up in a nearby unincorporated area known locally as Nutbush, a place she'd celebrate in the 1973 song "Nutbush City Limits." There was family turmoil in her life at an early age, as her mother abandoned her abusive father when Anna was eleven; as a teen she was a social worker, a cheerleader and an aspiring nurse. As a sideline she did a nightclub act with her sister Ruby Alline; history took its course when she caught Ike Turner and his Kings of Rhythm at a St. Louis gig and talked her way onstage. Ike took control of her life as well as her career, giving her the name Tina Turner years before they were actually married. As a duo they produced a number of landmarks, including a hit cover of Sly Stone's "I Want to Take You Higher" and the Phil Spector-produced "River Deep, Mountain High" (which Spector considered his greatest record; legend holds that he never got over its lack of chart success). Tina's ferocious live performances established her as a vocal powerhouse as well as a sex symbol; her rock & roll fans included the Rolling Stones who had Ike & Tina open their U.S. tour in 1966. But there were problems behind the scenes as Ike developed a raging cocaine habit; Tina began working more on her own (playing the Acid Queen in The Who's "Tommy" film in 1975), and the couple divorced in 1978. Tina would later reveal (in her 1986 autobiography I, Tina) that Ike was physically abusive; Ike was not a well-respected figure when he died of an overdose in 2007. Tina slowly rebuilt her career, working with fans/peers Rod Stewart and Chuck Berry. 1982 brought a surprise U.K. hit, a cover of the Temptations' "Ball of Confusion" with the techno duo B.E.F. (alias Heaven 17). This led to a U.K.-produced comeback album, Private Dancer, which was a sensation on both sides of the Atlantic, spawning six hit singles (seven in the U.K., where the album included the Beatles song "Help!") including "What's Love Got to Do With It," the signature song for the remainder of her career. Tina remained a fixture on the charts and in pop culture for decades to come; the next hit ("We Don't Need Another Hero") appeared in the movie "Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome" (1985), in which she also acted. Most of her later records followed in a pop/rock direction, and she continued to work with fellow superstars-singing with Mick Jagger at Live Aid, and recording a U2-written theme for the James Bond movie "Goldeneye" (1995). The 1993 biography film "What's Love Got to Do With It" added to her legend and hinged largely on the conflicts with Ike. She moved toward retirement at the end of the 2000s, making sporadic appearances with Beyonce and the group Beyond (a Buddhist-themed group from her adopted home in Switzerland). In 2018, she published her second memoir, My Love Story. Tina Turner died on May 24, 2023 in Küsnacht, Switzerland at the age of 83.