Tina Turner: The trauma and triumph of a music legend

Published

2 years ago

May 25, 2023

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“Look what I have done in this lifetime, with this body,” said Tina Turner, in a documentary released about her life in 2021. “I’m a girl from a cotton field, that pulled myself above what was not taught to me.”

Tina Turner‘s life was a story of trauma and triumph – she was the star known for her energetic stage performances and her incomparable soulful, husky voice, who overcame several personal and professional struggles to become the Queen of Rock ‘n Roll.

Following her death at the age of 83, tributes have been paid to a “legend”, an “icon” and a “remarkable force of nature,” from fellow music stars to the White House, with clips of her biggest hits – including Proud Mary, Nutbush City Limits, The Best, We Don’t Need Another Hero, and What’s Love Got To Do With It – flooding social media.

‘The world loses a legend’ – tributes to Tina Turner

Throughout her career, Turner won a total of 12 Grammys and was a two-time inductee into the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall Of Fame, as a solo artist and as part of the duo she formed with ex-husband, Ike Turner, in the 1960s.

She was the first woman to appear on the cover of Rolling Stone and a record breaker – previously holding the Guinness World Record for the largest paying audience for a solo performer, attracting an audience of 180,000 for her show at the Maracana Stadium in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in 1988.

And she also inspired an award-winning musical based on her incredible life – the story of the star who achieved stratospheric success, including sales of more than 100 million records worldwide, after overcoming years of abuse from both her father and ex-husband, and pushback from those who told her she could not make it as a solo star.

Tina Turner was born Anna Mae Bullock in Nutbush, Tennessee, on 26 November 1939, to parents Zelma Priscilla and Floyd Richard Bullock. At the age of 11, she moved to live with her grandmother after her mother left her abusive relationship with her father.

Aged 16, she joined her mother and sister Alline in the city of St Louis in Missouri, which is where she encountered her future husband for the first time.

She soon joined his band The Kings Of Rhythm as its first female member – and when she reimagined herself as Tina Turner in 1960, the group reformed to become the Ike And Tina Turner Revue.

That same year, Turner gave birth to their first child Ronnie and the couple wed in Tijuana, Mexico, in 1962. Ronnie was her second child; her first, Craig Raymond Turner, was with the saxophonist for the Kings Of Rhythm, Raymond Hill.

The group produced a string of RnB hits, including A Fool In Love and It’s Gonna Work Out Fine, but it was the release of River Deep – Mountain High in 1966 that saw their popularity soar around the world. The release was followed by a UK tour with The Rolling Stones as the band’s support act.

Songs such as Come Together, Honky Tonk Woman and Proud Mary helped cement their status, with the latter winning them a Grammy in 1972.

But behind the scenes, Turner was enduring abuse at the hands of her husband.

She stayed with him until 1976, but later revealed she had attempted suicide during their relationship. “I simply couldn’t take any more,” she wrote in her 2018 memoir, of the moment she hit rock bottom.

During their divorce, she reportedly asked for nothing more than the right to keep the use of her stage name, and she went on to reinvent herself as a solo star.

It wasn’t easy, with a slow start for debut album Tina Turns The Country On! in 1974, followed by Acid Queen in 1975, but Turner pushed back against those who told her that, as a black woman approaching 40, she would never make the transition to rock.

Throughout the 1980s, she rebuilt her career, with a string of hits starting in 1983 with a cover of Al Green’s Let’s Stay Together, and the 1984 release of her album Private Dancer. Her most recognisable song, a cover of The Best, was released in 1989. By then, her image of big hair and mini-skirts had become iconic, her famous legs becoming almost as famous as her distinctive voice.

In 1986, Turner was honoured with a star on the Hollywood Walk Of Fame. Her first induction into the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall Of Fame, for her work with Ike, came in 1991, though neither attended the ceremony. Her induction as a solo artist came some 30 years later, in 2021.

“If they’re still giving me awards at 81, I must have done something right,” she said in a recorded acceptance speech.

She was inducted by Angela Bassett, the actress who portrayed Turner in the 1993 film What’s Love Got To Do With It. Both Bassett and Laurence Fishburne, who played Ike, were nominated for Oscars for their performances.

“Imagine, a black girl from Nutbush, Tennessee, who embodied more talent than her small town could have ever dreamed,” Bassett said at the Hall Of Fame ceremony. “Imagine that same girl breaking through every barrier to one day make history.

“People still tell me how much Tina has meant to them. I know exactly what they mean, because she has meant that much and more to me. I too am one of those people blessed by Tina’s remarkable gift to inspire.”

In the 1990s, Turner joined the list of Bond musicians, voicing the title song for Pierce Brosnan’s Goldeneye.

After a brief break from showbusiness, she returned to the limelight in 2008 at the Grammy Awards, where she performed Proud Mary alongside Beyonce. Other notable duets through her career included performing with David Bowie, and with The Rolling Stones during Live Aid in 1985.

In 2008, she embarked on her 50th-anniversary tour, and in 2016 she announced Tina – The Tina Turner Musical.

In 2021, she sold the rights to her back catalogue after reaching an agreement with BMG for an undisclosed sum, and the last of her 34 UK Top 40 hits was released in 2020, when she re-recorded What’s Love Got To Do With It with Norwegian DJ Kygo.

Turner’s solo works include 10 studio albums, two live albums, two soundtracks and five compilations, which together have sold more than 100 million records. As well as her music, Turner also starred in films including Tommy in 1975, Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome in 1985, and Last Action Hero in 1993.

In her personal life, she met music producer Erwin Bach in the 1980s and the pair married years later on the banks of Lake Zurich in Switzerland, where they lived. In 2013, Bach saved her life by donating her one of his kidneys, she revealed in her memoir in 2018.

She faced heartache that year, when her eldest son Craig died by suicide, and again in 2022 when her second son Ronnie died of cancer.

Known for her strength and resilience throughout her life, in an interview with the New York Times in 2019, she said: “I don’t necessarily want to be a ‘strong’ person. I had a terrible life. I just kept going.”

Turner always kept going.

And in what must have been one of her last interviews before she died, she told The Guardian exactly how she wanted to be remembered – as the Queen of Rock ‘n’ Roll. “A woman who showed other women that it is okay to strive for success on their own terms.”

World

US envoy meets Putin for talks – as Trump urges Russia to ‘get moving’ on Ukraine

Published

10 hours ago

April 11, 2025

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US envoy meets Putin for talks - as Trump urges Russia to 'get moving' on Ukraine

Donald Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff has met Vladimir Putin for talks in Russia – as the US president called on Moscow to “get moving” with ending the war in Ukraine.

Mr Witkoff, who has been pressing the Kremlin to accept a truce, visited Mr Putin in St Petersburg after earlier meeting the Russian leader’s international co-operation envoy Kirill Dmitriev.

Mr Putin was shown on state TV greeting Mr Witkoff at the city’s presidential library at the start of the latest discussions about the search for a peace deal on Ukraine.

Before Friday’s meeting, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov played down expectations of a breakthrough and told state media the visit would not be “momentous”.

Follow the latest updates on the war in Ukraine

However, Sky News Moscow correspondent Ivor Bennett said he believes the meeting – Mr Witkoff’s third with Mr Putin this year – is significant as a sign of the Trump administration’s “increasing frustration at the lack of progress on peace talks”.

Earlier on Friday, Mr Trump issued his latest social media statement on trying to end the war, writing on Truth Social: “Russia has to get moving. Too many people ere [sic] DYING, thousands a week, in a terrible and senseless war – A war that should have never happened, and wouldn’t have happened, if I were President!!!”

Dialogue between the US and Russia, aimed at agreeing a ceasefire ahead of a possible peace deal to end the war, has recently appeared to have stalled over disagreements around conditions for a full pause.

Secondary sanctions could be imposed on countries that buy Russian oil, Mr Trump has said, if he feels Moscow is dragging its feet on a deal.

Mr Putin has said he is ready in principle to agree a full ceasefire, but argues crucial conditions have yet to be agreed – and that what he calls the root causes of the war have yet to be addressed.

The Russian president wants to dismantle Ukraine as an independent, functioning state and has demanded Kyiv recognise Moscow’s annexation of Crimea and other partly occupied areas, and pull its forces out, as well as a pledge for Ukraine to never join NATO and for the size of its army to be limited.

Zelenskyy renews support calls after attack on home city

Meanwhile, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy has renewed his appeals for more Patriot air defence systems after the deaths of 20 people, including nine children, who were killed when a Russian missile hit apartment buildings and a playground in his home city of Kryvyi Rih last week.

Speaking online at a meeting of the so-called Ramstein group of about 50 nations that provide military support to Ukraine, named after a previous meeting at America’s Ramstein air base in Germany in 2022, Mr Zelenskyy said recent Russian attacks showed Moscow was not ready to accept and implement any realistic and effective peace proposals.

Mr Zelenskyy also made his evening address to the nation, saying: “Ukraine is not just asking – we are ready to buy appropriate additional systems.”

The UK’s defence secretary, John Healy, has said this is “the critical year” for Ukraine – and has confirmed £450m in funding for a military support package.

World

Tech executive and his family die after sightseeing helicopter crashes in New York

Published

10 hours ago

April 11, 2025

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Tech executive and his family die after sightseeing helicopter crashes in New York

A family of five Spanish tourists, including three children, have been killed in a helicopter crash in New York City.

A New York City Hall spokesman identified two of those killed as Agustin Escobar, a Siemens executive, and Merce Camprubi Montal – believed to be his wife, NBC News reported.

The pilot was also killed as the aircraft crashed into the Hudson River at around 3.17pm on Thursday.

New York Police commissioner Jessica Tisch said divers had recovered all those on board from the helicopter, which was upside down in the water.

“Four victims were pronounced dead on scene and two more were removed to local area hospitals, where sadly both succumbed to their injuries,” she said.

The Spanish president Pedro Sanchez called the news “devastating”.

“An unimaginable tragedy. I share the grief of the victims’ loved ones at this heartbreaking time,” he wrote on X.

Rotor blade ‘flew off’

The aircraft was on a tourist flight of Manhattan, run by the New York Helicopters company.

Witnesses described seeing the main rotor blade flying off moments before it dropped out the sky.

Lesly Camacho, a worker at a restaurant along the river in Hoboken, said she saw the helicopter spinning uncontrollably before it slammed into the water.

“There was a bunch of smoke coming out. It was spinning pretty fast, and it landed in the water really hard,” she said.

Another witness said “the chopper blade flew off”.

“I don’t know what happened to the tail, but it just straight up dropped,” Avi Rakesh told Sky’s US partner, NBC News.

Video on social media showed parts of the Bell 206 helicopter tumbling through the air and landing in the river.

New York Mayor Eric Adams confirmed the six deaths and said authorities believed the tourists were from Spain.

He said the flight had taken off from a downtown heliport at around 3pm.

The crash happened close to Pier 40 and the Holland tunnel, which links lower Manhattan’s Tribeca neighbourhood with Jersey City to its west.

Tracking service Flight Radar 24 published what it said was the helicopter’s route, with the aircraft appearing to be in the sky for 15 minutes before the crash.

The Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board have started an investigation.

Thursday’s incident comes less than three month after 67 people died when an army helicopter and American Airlines jet collided over the Potomac River in Washington DC.

World

Ksenia Karelina: Ballerina arrives home in US after ‘nightmare’ of Russian penal colony

Published

10 hours ago

April 11, 2025

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Ksenia Karelina: Ballerina arrives home in US after 'nightmare' of Russian penal colony

A former ballerina who spent more than a year in a Russian jail for donating £40 to a charity supporting Ukraine has returned home to the US after being freed in a prisoner exchange.

Ksenia Karelina landed at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland at around 11pm, local time, on Thursday.

A smiling Ms Karelina was greeted on the runway by her fiance, the professional boxer Chris van Heerden, and given flowers by Morgan Ortagus, President Donald Trump’s deputy special envoy to the Middle East.

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Van Heerden said in a statement he was “overjoyed to hear that the love of my life, Ksenia Karelina, is on her way home from wrongful detention in Russia.

“She has endured a nightmare for 15 months and I cannot wait to hold her. Our dog, Boots, is also eagerly awaiting her return.”

He thanked Mr Trump and his envoys, as well as prominent public figures who had championed her case, including Dana White, a friend of Mr Trump and CEO of the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC).

Ms Karelina, 34, a US-Russian citizen also identified as Ksenia Khavana, was accused of treason when she was arrested in Yekaterinburg, in southwestern Russia, while visiting family in February last year.

Investigators searched her mobile phone and found she made a $51.80 (£40) donation to Razom, a charity that provides aid to Ukraine, on the first day of Russia’s invasion in 2022.

She admitted the charge at a closed trial in the city in August last year and was later jailed for 12 years, to be served in a penal colony.

At a cabinet meeting on Thursday, Mr Trump, who wants to normalise relations with Moscow, said the Kremlin “released the young ballerina and she is now out, and that was good. So we appreciate that”.

He said the release followed conversations with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Russian security services accused her of “proactively” collecting money for a Ukrainian organisation that was supplying gear to Kyiv’s forces.

The First Department, a Russian rights group, said the charges stemmed from a $51.80 donation to a US charity aiding Ukraine.

Washington, which had called her case “absolutely ludicrous”, released Arthur Petrov, who it was holding on charges of smuggling sensitive microelectronics to Russia, in the prisoner swap in Abu Dhabi.

Karelina was among a growing number of Americans arrested in Russia in recent years as tensions between Moscow and Washington spiked over the war in Ukraine.

Her release is the latest in a series of high-profile prisoner exchanges Russia and the US carried out in the last three years – and the second since Mr Trump took office.

White House national security adviser Mike Waltz said members of the Trump administration “continue to work around the clock to ensure Americans detained abroad are returned home to their families”.