Tag: Tina Turner

Tina Turner (born Anna Mae Bullock; November 26, 1939) is an American-born singer, songwriter, dancer, actress, and author. Born and raised in the Southeastern United States, Turner relinquished her American citizenship after obtaining Swiss citizenship in 2013.Born Anna Mae Bullock, near Brownsville, TN, she began singing as a teen and joined Ike Turner’s touring show as an 18-year-old backup vocalist. Just two years later, she was the star of the show, the attention-grabbing focal point for an incredibly smooth-running soul revue headed by Ike and his Kings of Rhythm. The couple began hitting the charts in 1960 with “A Fool in Love,” and notched charting singles throughout the 1960s such as “River Deep-Mountain High” and in 1971 with “Proud Mary.”She began her career in 1958 as a featured singer with Ike Turner’s Kings of Rhythm, first recording under the name “Little Ann.” Her introduction to the public as Tina Turner began in 1960 as a member of the Ike & Tina Turner Revue.Success followed with a string of notable hits credited to the duo, including “A Fool in Love”, “River Deep – Mountain High” (1966), “Proud Mary” (1971), and “Nutbush City Limits” (1973), a song which she herself wrote. In her autobiography, I, Tina, she revealed several instances of severe domestic abuse against her by Ike Turner prior to their 1976 split and subsequent 1978 divorce. Raised a Baptist, she encountered faith with Nichiren Shoshu Buddhism in 1971, crediting the spiritual chant of Nam Myoho Renge Kyo, which Turner claims helped her to endure during difficult times.After her divorce from Ike Turner, she rebuilt her career through live performances. In the 1980s, Turner launched a major comeback with another string of hits, starting in late 1983 with the single “Let’s Stay Together” followed by the 1984 release of her fifth solo album Private Dancer which became a worldwide success. The album contained the song “What’s Love Got to Do with It”, which became Turner’s biggest hit and won four Grammy Awards including Record of the Year. Her solo success continued throughout the 1980s and 90s with multi-platinum albums including Break Every Rule and Foreign Affair, and with singles such as “We Don’t Need Another Hero (Thunderdome)”, “Typical Male”, “The Best”, “I Don’t Wanna Fight” and “GoldenEye” for the 1995 James Bond film of the same name. In 1993, “What’s Love Got to Do with It” was used as the title of a biographical film adapted from her autobiography, along with the film’s accompanying soundtrack album. In addition to her musical career, Turner has also garnered success acting in films, including the role of the Acid Queen in the 1975 rock musical Tommy, a starring role alongside Mel Gibson in the 1985 action film Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, and a cameo role in the 1993 film Last Action Hero.One of the world’s best-selling artists of all time, she has also been referred to as The Queen of Rock ‘n’ Roll. Turner has been termed the most successful female Rock ‘n’ Roll artist, receiving eleven Grammy Awards, including eight competitive awards and three Grammy Hall of Fame awards. Turner has also sold more concert tickets than any other solo performer in history. Her combined album and single sales total approximately 180 million copies worldwide, She is noted for her energetic stage presence, powerful vocals, and career longevity. In 2008, Turner returned from semi-retirement to embark on her Tina!: 50th Anniversary Tour. Turner’s tour became one of the highest selling ticketed shows of 2008–09. Rolling Stone ranked Turner no. 63 on their list of 100 greatest artists of all time, and no. 17 on their list of 100 greatest singers of all time. In 1991, Turner was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.Turner was born Anna Mae Bullock on November 26, 1939, in Nutbush, an unincorporated area in Haywood County, Tennessee. Her parents were Zelma Priscilla (née Currie) and Floyd Richard Bullock. Anna Mae was born at Poindexter Farm on Highway 180, where her father worked as an overseer of the sharecroppers. She is of African-American descent, with approximately 33% European and 1% Native American ancestry. (The latter was revealed when she appeared on the PBS documentary African American Lives 2, and the host Henry Louis Gates shared the results of Turner’s ancestral tests.)Anna Mae had an older sister, Ruby Aillene. As young children, Anna Mae and Aillene were separated when their parents relocated to Knoxville, Tennessee, to work at a defense facility during World War II. Anna went to stay with her strict, religious paternal grandparents, Alex and Roxanna Bullock, who were deacon and deaconess at the Woodlawn Missionary Baptist Church, which was located on Woodlawn Road off Highway 19. After the war, the sisters reunited with their parents and moved with them to Knoxville. Two years later, the family returned to Nutbush to live in the Flagg Grove community, where Anna attended Flagg Grove Elementary School from first through eighth grade. In 1889, her great-great uncle had sold the land on which the school was built to the school trustees.As a youngster, Anna Mae sang in the church choir at Nutbush’s Spring Hill Baptist Church. When she was 11, her mother ran off without warning, seeking freedom from her abusive relationship with Floyd Bullock. Zelma relocated to St. Louis to live with Anna Mae’s great-aunt. As a preteen, Anna Mae worked as a domestic worker for the Henderson family. When Anna Mae was 13, her father married another woman and moved to Detroit. Anna Mae and her sister were sent to live with their grandmother Georgeanna in Brownsville, Tennessee. Anna Mae later stated in her memoir, I, Tina, that she felt her mother had not loved her, and that she “wasn’t wanted”, stating further that her mother had planned to leave her father when pregnant with Anna Mae. “She was a very young woman who didn’t want another kid”, Anna Mae wrote. Her relationship with her mother remained estranged until Bullock’s death in 1999.A self-professed tomboy, Anna Mae joined both the cheerleading squad and the female basketball team at Carver High School in Brownsville, and “socialized every chance she got.” Her first boyfriend, while she was living in Brownsville, was Harry Taylor, who originally attended a rival school to hers. Taylor relocated to Anna’s school to be near her. The relationship ended after Anna Mae learned Harry had married another woman.When Anna Mae was 16, her grandmother died suddenly. After the funeral, Anna Mae went to live with her mother in St. Louis, where she was reunited with her sister. There, Anna Mae graduated from Sumner High School in 1958. After her graduation, she worked as a nurse’s aide at Barnes-Jewish Hospital and dreamed of becoming a nurse.Anna and her sister began to frequent nightclubs in the St. Louis and East St. Louis areas around this time. At Club Manhattan, a nightclub in the East St. Louis area, she first saw Ike Turner and his band, the Kings of Rhythm, perform. Anna was impressed by the band’s music and Ike’s talent, claiming the bandleader’s music put her “into a trance.” Anna felt the urge to sing on stage with Ike’s band despite the fact that few women had ever sung with him. One night in 1956, 16-year-old Anna was given a microphone by Kings of Rhythm drummer Gene Washington during an intermission. Upon hearing her sing, Ike asked her if she knew more songs; she was allowed to sing that night, becoming a guest vocalist from then on. Through this period, Ike taught her the points of voice control and performance. Her first studio recording was in 1958, singing background, under the name “Little Ann”, on the Ike Turner song, “Box Top”, alongside singer Carlson Oliver.In 1960, Ike wrote an R&B song, “A Fool in Love”, originally for Kings of Rhythm vocalist Art Lassiter. Lassiter failed to show up to the recording studio and Anna eventually was allowed to sing the song after much pleading to Ike. Ike agreed to use her voice as a “dummy vocal”, with the intention of erasing her vocals and adding Lassiter’s at a later date. Although some felt that the demo with Anna’s voice was “high pitched” and “screechy”, the song received decent airtime in St. Louis. Local St. Louis deejay Dave Dixon convinced Ike to send the tape to Juggy Murray, president of R&B label, Sue Records. Upon hearing the song, Murray was impressed with Anna’s vocals, later stating that her vocals “sounded like screaming dirt… it was a funky sound.” Murray bought the track and paid Ike a $25,000 (around $208,620 as of 2017) advance for recording and publishing rights. Murray also convinced Turner to make Anna “the star of the show.” It was at this point that Ike Turner renamed Anna Mae Bullock “Tina” because the name rhymed with the television character Sheena. Ike patented the name Tina Turner as a form of protection so that if Anna left him like his previous lead singers, he could replace her with another singer and have her perform as Tina.”A Fool in Love” was released in July 1960 and became an immediate hit, peaking at number 2 on the Hot R&B Sides chart and number 27 on the Billboard Hot 100 that October. Kurt Loder described the track as “the blackest record to ever creep into the white pop charts since Ray Charles’ gospel-styled ‘What’d I Say’ that previous summer.” A second pop hit, “It’s Gonna Work Out Fine” (1961), reached the top 20 and earned the group a Grammy Award nomination for Best Rock and Roll Performance. Notable singles released during the duo’s Sue Records period included the R&B hits, “I Idolize You”, “Poor Fool”, and “Tra-La-La-La.” In 1964, Ike & Tina left Sue and signed with Kent Records, releasing the modest single, “I Can’t Believe What You Say.” The following year, they signed with Loma Records, a subsidiary of Warner Bros. Records and run by Bob Krasnow, who had become their manager shortly after they left Sue Records. Between 1964 and 1969, Ike & Tina signed with more than ten labels.While touring to support the record, Ike created his own musical revue, the Ike and Tina Turner Revue, which included the Kings of Rhythm and a girl group that Ike named The Ikettes backing Tina, while he remained in the background, often playing his guitar to the back of Tina. Wanting to maintain their base and increase finances, Ike Turner put Tina and the entire Revue through a rigorous touring schedule across the United States, gigging 90 days straight in dates around the country. During the days of the chitlin’ circuit, the Ike and Tina Turner Revue built a reputation that a writer for the History of Rock site cited as “one of the most hottest, most durable, and potentially most explosive of all R&B ensembles” with its show rivaling that of the James Brown Show in terms of musical spectacle. The shows, organized by Ike Turner, provided them financial success. Due to their successful performances, the couple was able to perform in front of diverse crowds in the American South due to the money they made from performing in Southern clubs. Between 1963 and 1966, the band toured constantly without the presence of a hit single. Tina’s own profile was raised after several solo appearances on shows, such as American Bandstand and Shindig!, while the entire Revue appeared on shows, such as Hollywood A Go-Go, The Andy Williams Show, and, in late 1965, in the concert film The Big T.N.T. Show.By the mid-1970s, Ike Turner’s excessive cocaine habit had gotten out of hand. During this period, Tina adopted the Nichiren Buddhism faith and chanting Nam Myoho Renge Kyo to help her deal with a stressful marriage and career. Due to Ike Turner’s drug abuse, some shows were either canceled or postponed. In July 1976, Ike Turner had plans to leave United Artists Records for a five-year, $150,000 deal with Cream Records. The deal was to be signed on July 6. On July 1, 1976, Ike and Tina were en route from Los Angeles to Dallas where the Revue had a gig at the Dallas Statler Hilton. Ike and Tina got into a fight during their ride to the hotel. Shortly after arriving to the hotel, Tina fled from the hotel and later hid at a friend’s house. On July 27, Tina sued for divorce on the grounds of irreconcilable differences. Ike claims in his book that Tina initiated the fight by purposely irritating him so that she’d have a reason to break up with him before they were scheduled to sign a new 5-year contract upon their return from Dallas.Tina later credited the Nichiren Buddhist faith and chanting Nam Myoho Renge Kyo with giving her the courage to strike out on her own. However, by walking out on Ike in the middle of a tour, she learned she was legally responsible to tour promoters for the canceled shows. After a year in court, their divorce was made final on March 29, 1978. In the divorce, she completely parted ways with him, retaining only her stage name and assuming responsibility for the debts incurred by the canceled tour as well as a significant Internal Revenue Service lien.Frustrated by Ike’s increasingly irrational behavior, though, Tina walked out just three years later. Turner converted to Buddhism in 1974 to help her conquer her troubling marriage to Ike Turner. Turner has credited Buddhism with giving her the courage to leave Ike and to find peace. Since then she has been acknowledged as one of the world’s most popular entertainers, biggest-selling music artists of all time, and the most successful female rock artist ever. She had record sales of nearly 200 million copies worldwide and sold more concert tickets than any other solo performer in music’s history.After leaving Ike Turner in 1976, and divorcing him in 1978, Turner didn’t get into a serious relationship again until she met a German record executive named Erwin Bach while at Heathrow Airport in London in 1985. After a year, they started dating and have been living together ever since. Bach is 17 years younger than Turner.Turner’s world tour Break Every Rule Tour had record- breaking ticket sales and was attended by over 4 million fans. Turner also beat out The Rolling Stones by touring Europe during her sold out Foreign Affair Tour in 1990 and playing to 4 million people in just six months. Her 1996 Wildest Dreams Tour was performed to 3.5 million fans.In 2000, she launched her Twenty Four Seven Tour that packed stadiums all over the world. It was the highest grossing tour of the year, and is the 5th biggest grossing tour in America ever. Her success and contributions to the rock music genre have garnered her title, “The Queen of Rock & Roll.”She is known for her overpowering and energetic stage presence, powerful vocals, ground-breaking concerts. She was listed on Rolling Stone’s list, “The Immortals: The Greatest Artists of All Time.” Turner is a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee, and she is also represented in the Grammy Hall of Fame by two of her recordings: “River Deep – Mountain High” (1999) and “Proud Mary” (2003).Turner has won eight Grammy Awards. In February 2008, at age 68, Turner performed together with Beyoncé at the 50th Annual Grammy Awards. In addition, she picked up a Grammy as a featured artist on River: The Joni Letters. On April 29, 2008, Turner announced that she would embark on her Tina: Live in Concert Tour on October 1 in Kansas City, MO, at the Sprint Center. Turner is the mother of two sons and adopted Ike Turner’s two children from other relationships.Turner has lived in Europe since the mid-1980s, having moved to London in 1986 before settling in Switzerland later that decade. In 1996, she began building a villa outside Nice, France, which was completed by 2000. Turner has been living in a lake house, Château Algonquin in Küsnacht, next to Zürich since moving there in 1994. She owned property in Cologne, London, and Los Angeles, and a villa on the French Riviera named Anna Fleur.On January 25, 2013, it was announced that Turner had applied for Swiss citizenship, and that she would relinquish her U.S. citizenship. In April, she undertook a mandatory citizenship test which included advanced knowledge of the German language and of Swiss history. On April 22, 2013, she became a citizen of Switzerland and was issued a Swiss passport. Turner signed the paperwork to give up her American citizenship at the U.S. embassy in Bern on October 24, 2013.Turner announced in December 2016 that she has been working on Tina, a new musical based on her life story, in collaboration with Phyllida Lloyd and Stage Entertainment.

Written by Dianne Washington