Age, Biography, and Wiki
Tina Turner, born Anna Mae Bullock, passed away on May 24, 2023, at the age of 83. She rose to fame in the 1950s with her husband Ike Turner and later became a solo sensation, known for her powerful voice and energetic stage performances.
| Occupation | Autobiographer |
|---|---|
| Date of Birth | 26 November 1939 |
| Age | 85 Years |
| Birth Place | Brownsville, Tennessee, US |
| Horoscope | Sagittarius |
| Country | Switzerland |
| Date of death | 24 May, 2023 |
| Died Place | Küsnacht, Switzerland |
Height, Weight, & Measurements
- Height: 5 ft 4 in (1.63 m).
- Weight: Not publicly disclosed.
- Measurements: Not publicly disclosed.
| Height | 63 m |
| Weight | |
| Body Measurements | |
| Eye Color | |
| Hair Color |
Dating & Relationship Status
Tina Turner was married twice:
- Ike Turner (married in 1962, divorced in 1976): Her first marriage was marked by domestic violence and ended in divorce.
- Erwin Bach (married in 2013, remained married until her death): Bach was a German music executive, and the couple lived together in Switzerland.
Turner rose to prominence as the lead singer of the husband-wife duo Ike & Tina Turner in 1960. Known for their explosive live performances with the Ikettes, they were "leading exponents" of soul music. Their tumultuous marriage led to a disbanding in 1976, and she embarked on a successful solo career, becoming one of the best-selling recording artists of all time, with estimated sales of 100 million records.
She was the youngest daughter of Floyd Richard Bullock and his wife Zelma Priscilla (née Currie). The family lived in the rural unincorporated community of Nutbush, Tennessee, where Bullock's father worked as an overseer of the sharecroppers at Poindexter Farm on Highway 180; she later recalled picking cotton with her family at an early age.
Bullock had two older sisters, Evelyn Juanita Currie and Ruby Alline Bullock, a songwriter. She was the first cousin once removed of bluesman Eugene Bridges. As young children, the three sisters were separated when their parents relocated to Knoxville, Tennessee, to work at a defense facility during World War II. Bullock went to stay with her strict, religious paternal grandparents, Alex and Roxanna Bullock, who were deacon and deaconess at the Woodlawn Missionary Baptist Church. 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 Bullock attended Flagg Grove Elementary School from first through eighth grade.
As a young girl, Bullock enjoyed singing and acting, and she often performed in the streets for change so she could go to the movies. She sang in the church choir at Nutbush's Spring Hill Baptist Church. In 1950, when she was 11, her mother Zelma left without warning, seeking freedom from her abusive relationship with Floyd by relocating to St. Louis. Two years after her mother left the family, her father married another woman and moved to Detroit. Bullock and her sisters were sent to live with their maternal grandmother, Georgeanna Currie, in Brownsville, Tennessee. She stated in her autobiography I, Tina that she felt her parents did not love her and that she was not wanted. Zelma had planned to leave Floyd but stayed once she became pregnant. Bullock recalled: "She was a very young woman who didn't want another kid."
As a teenager, Bullock worked as a domestic worker for the Henderson family in Ripley, Tennessee. She was at the Henderson house when she was notified that her half-sister Evelyn had died in a car crash alongside her cousins Margaret Currie and Vela Evans, while Vela survived the car crash. A self-professed tomboy, Bullock joined both the cheerleading squad and the female basketball team at Carver High School in Brownsville, and "socialized every chance she got". When Bullock was 16, her grandmother died, so she went to live with her mother in St. Louis. She graduated from Sumner High School in 1958. After high school, Bullock worked as a nurse's aide at Barnes-Jewish Hospital.
In 1974, the duo released the Grammy-nominated album The Gospel According to Ike & Tina, which was nominated for Best Soul Gospel Performance. Ike also received a solo nomination for his single "Father Alone" from the album. Tina Turner's first solo album, Tina Turns the Country On!, earned her a nomination for Best R&B Vocal Performance, Female. That year, Tina Turner filmed the rock opera Tommy in London. She played the Acid Queen, a drug-addicted prostitute; her performance was critically acclaimed. Shortly after filming wrapped, Turner appeared on Ann-Margret's TV special. Following the release of Tommy in 1975, Tina Turner released another solo album: Acid Queen. The album reached No. 39 on the Billboard R&B chart. It produced the charting singles "Baby, Get It On" and a cover of Led Zeppelin's "Whole Lotta Love".
By the mid-1970s, Ike was heavily addicted to cocaine, which hindered his relationship with Tina. In 1976, they headlined at the Waldorf Astoria New York and signed a television deal with CBS-TV. Ike made plans for them to leave United Artists Records for a five-year deal with Cream Records for $150,000 per year; the deal was to be signed on July 5.
While still in Brownsville, Turner fell in love for the first time with Harry Taylor. They met at a high school basketball game. Taylor initially attended a different school, but he relocated to be near her. In 1986, she told Rolling Stone: "Harry was real popular and had tons of girlfriends, but eventually I got him, and we went steady for a year." Their relationship ended after she discovered that Taylor had married another girl who was expecting his child.
After moving to St. Louis, Turner and her sister Alline became acquainted with Ike Turner's Kings of Rhythm. Alline was dating the band's drummer Eugene Washington and Tina began dating the saxophonist Raymond Hill. After Tina became pregnant during her senior year of high school, she moved in with Hill, who lived with Ike Turner. She recalled, "I didn't love him as much as I'd loved Harry. But he was good-looking. I thought, 'My baby's going to be beautiful. Their relationship ended after Hill broke his ankle during a wrestling match with Kings of Rhythm singer Carlson Oliver.
Turner likened her early relationship with Ike Turner to that of a "brother and sister from another lifetime". They were platonic friends from the time they met in 1956 until 1960. Their affair began while Ike was with his live-in girlfriend Lorraine Taylor. They became intimate when she went to sleep with him after another musician threatened to go into her room.
After recording "A Fool in Love" in 1960, a pregnant Turner told Ike that she did not want to continue their relationship; he responded by striking her in the head with a wooden shoe stretcher. Turner recalled that this incident was the first time he "instilled fear" in her, but she decided to stay with him because she "really did care about him". After the birth of their son Ronnie in October 1960, they moved to Los Angeles in 1962 and married in Tijuana. In 1963, Ike purchased a house in the View Park area. They brought their son Ronnie, Turner's son Craig, and Ike's two sons with Lorraine (Ike Jr. and Michael) from St. Louis to live with them. She later revealed in I, Tina that Ike was abusive and promiscuous throughout their marriage, which led to her suicide attempt in 1968 by overdosing on Valium pills. She said, "It was my relationship with Ike that made me most unhappy. At first, I had really been in love with him. Look what he'd done for me. But he was totally unpredictable." Later on, in his old age, Ike was diagnosed with bipolar disorder.
By the mid-1970s, Ike was heavily addicted to cocaine, which hindered his relationship with Turner. She abruptly left Ike after they got into a bloody fight on their way to the Dallas Statler Hilton on July 1, 1976. She fled with only 36 cents and a Mobil credit card in her pocket to the nearby Ramada Inn across the freeway. On July 27, Turner filed for divorce on the grounds of irreconcilable differences. Her divorce petition asked for $4,000 a month in alimony, $1,000 a month in child support, and custody of her sons Craig and Ronnie. The divorce was finalized on March 29, 1978. In the final divorce decree, Turner took responsibility for missed concert dates as well as an IRS lien. Turner retained songwriter royalties from songs she had written, but Ike got the publishing royalties for his compositions and hers. She also kept her two Jaguars, furs, jewelry, and her stage name. Turner gave Ike her share of their Bolic Sound recording studio, publishing companies, and real estate, and he kept his four cars. Several promoters lost money and sued to recoup their losses. For almost two years, she received food stamps and played small clubs to pay off debts.
In 1986, Turner met German music executive Erwin Bach, who was sent by her European record label (EMI) to greet Turner at Düsseldorf Airport. Bach was over sixteen years her junior. Initially friends, they began dating later that year. In July 2013, after a 27-year romantic relationship, they married in a civil ceremony on the banks of Lake Zurich in Küsnacht, Switzerland.
Turner's younger son, Ronnie, played bass guitar in a band called Manufactured Funk with songwriter and musician Patrick Moten. Ronnie also played for both of his parents' bands. Through him, Turner had two grandchildren. He was married to French singer Afida Turner. Ronnie died from complications of colon cancer in December 2022.
During Turner's divorce trial, Ike sent their four sons to live with Tina and gave her money for one month's rent. Ike Turner Jr. worked as a sound engineer at Bolic Sound and briefly for Turner after her divorce, later winning a Grammy Award for producing his father's album Risin' with the Blues. He toured with former Ikette Randi Love as Sweet Randi Love and the Love Thang Band. Ike Turner Jr. stated that he and his brothers had a distant relationship with their mother (Tina). Turner wrote in her autobiography I, Tina that after her divorce she became "a little bit estranged" from all her sons except Craig. In 1989, Turner told TV Week that "she's still there for the boys", but there were reports of Turner's estrangement from her sons in the years before her death.
Turner sometimes referred to herself as a "Buddhist–Baptist", alluding to her upbringing in the Baptist church where her father was a deacon and her later conversion to Buddhism as an adult. In a 2016 interview with Lion's Roar magazine, she declared, "I consider myself a Buddhist." The February 15, 1979, issue of Jet magazine featured Turner with her Buddhist altar on the cover. Turner credited the Liturgy of Nichiren Daishonin and Soka Gakkai International for her introduction to spiritual knowledge.
Her chances of receiving a kidney transplant were considered low and she was urged to start dialysis. She signed up with an organization that facilitates assisted suicide, a procedure which is legal in Switzerland, becoming a member of Exit International. However, her husband offered to donate a kidney for transplant. She accepted his donation and had kidney transplantation surgery on April 7, 2017. Turner also openly discussed her feeling of shame after discovering that she had dyslexia.
| Parents | |
| Husband | Ike Turner (m. 1962-1978) Erwin Bach (m. 2013) |
| Sibling | |
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Net Worth and Salary
At the time of her death, Tina Turner's net worth was estimated to be around $250 million. However, some reports suggest it could have been as high as $280 million by 2025, considering residual income from her music catalog and other assets. Her annual income was estimated to be around $30 million.
In 1976 and 1977, Tina Turner earned income by appearing on TV shows such as The Hollywood Squares, Donny & Marie, The Sonny & Cher Show, and The Brady Bunch Hour. After her separation from Ike, lawsuits were mounting for canceled Ike & Tina Turner gigs. She resumed touring to pay off her debts, with finances given to her by United Artists executive Mike Stewart. In 1977, she re-emerged with new costumes created by Bob Mackie. She headlined a series of cabaret shows at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas and took her act to smaller venues in the United States. Later that year, she embarked on her first solo concert tour in Australia.
In February 2006, Turner released "Teach Me Again", a duet single with Italian singer-songwriter Elisa that was recorded for the anthology film All the Invisible Children. The whole revenue from the single's sales was donated to charity projects for children led by the World Food Programme and UNICEF.
Career, Business, and Investments
Tina Turner had a prolific career spanning over six decades:
- Early Career: She began performing in the 1950s with Ike Turner's band, the Kings of Rhythm, gaining popularity with hits like "A Fool in Love" and "River Deep – Mountain High".
- Solo Career: After her divorce from Ike, Turner embarked on a successful solo career, releasing hits like "What's Love Got to Do with It?", "Private Dancer", and "We Don't Need Another Hero (Thunderdome)".
- Music Rights Sale: In 2021, she sold her music catalog for approximately $50 million to BMG Rights Management.
- Retirement and Later Years: Turner retired from performing in 2009 but continued to earn millions through her eponymous musical and residuals from her music catalog.
Turner won a total of 12 Grammy Awards. These awards include eight competitive Grammy Awards; she shares the record (with Pat Benatar, and with Sheryl Crow) for most awards (four) given for Best Female Rock Vocal Performance. Three of her recordings, "River Deep – Mountain High" (1999), "Proud Mary" (2003), and "What's Love Got to Do with It" (2012) are in the Grammy Hall of Fame. Turner is the only female artist to have won a Grammy in the pop, rock, and R&B fields. Turner received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2018. Turner also won Grammys as a member of USA for Africa and as a performer at the 1986 Prince's trust concert.
Social Network
Tina Turner was not known for being active on social media platforms, as she preferred to keep a low public profile outside of her music and performances.
Turner's Break Every Rule World Tour (1987–88) became the highest-grossing female tour of the 1980s and set a Guinness World Record for the then-largest paying audience in a concert (180,000). Her success as a live performer continued with Wildest Dreams Tour (1996–97), the second highest-grossing female tour of the 1990s, and Twenty Four Seven Tour (2000), the highest-grossing tour of the year in North America. In 2009, she retired after completing her Tina!: 50th Anniversary Tour. As an actress, Turner appeared in the films Tommy (1975), Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (1985) and Last Action Hero (1993). Her life was dramatized in the film What's Love Got to Do with It (1993), based on her autobiography I, Tina: My Life Story (1986). Turner was also the subject of the jukebox musical Tina (2018) and documentary film Tina (2021).
In 1960, Ike Turner wrote "A Fool in Love" for singer Art Lassiter. Bullock was to sing background with Lassiter's backing vocalists, the Artettes. Lassiter failed to show up for the recording session at Technisonic Studios. Since Turner had already paid for the studio time, Bullock suggested that she sing the lead. He decided to use Bullock to record a demo with the intention of erasing her vocals and adding Lassiter's at a later date. Local St. Louis disc jockey Dave Dixon convinced Turner to send the tape to Juggy Murray, president of R&B label Sue Records. Upon hearing the song, Murray was impressed with Bullock's vocals, later stating that "Tina sounded like screaming dirt. It was a funky sound". Murray bought the track and paid Turner a $25,000 advance for the recording and publishing rights. Murray also convinced Turner to make Bullock "the star of the show". Turner responded by renaming Bullock "Tina" because it rhymed with Sheena. He was inspired by Sheena, Queen of the Jungle and Nyoka the Jungle Girl to create her stage persona. Turner added his last name and trademarked the name "Tina Turner" as a form of protection; his idea was that if Bullock left him like his previous singers had, he could replace her with another "Tina Turner". However, family and friends still called her Ann. Bullock was introduced to the public as Tina Turner with the single "A Fool in Love" in July 1960. It reached No. 2 on the Hot R&B Sides chart and No. 27 on the Billboard Hot 100. Journalist Kurt Loder described the track as "the blackest record to ever creep into the white pop charts since Ray Charles's gospel-styled 'What'd I Say' that previous summer". Another single from the duo, "It's Gonna Work Out Fine", reached No. 14 on the Hot 100 and No. 2 on the R&B chart in 1961, earning them a Grammy nomination for Best Rock and Roll Performance. Other singles Ike and Tina Turner released between 1960 and 1962 included the R&B hits "I Idolize You", "Poor Fool", and "Tra La La La La".
Tina Turner's profile was raised after several solo appearances on shows such as American Bandstand and Shindig! while the entire revue appeared on Hollywood a Go-Go. In 1965, music producer Phil Spector attended an Ike & Tina Turner show at a club on the Sunset Strip, and he invited them to appear in the concert film The Big T.N.T. Show.
In the fall of 1969, Ike & Tina Turner's profile in their home country was raised after opening for the Rolling Stones on their US tour. They gained more exposure from performances on The Ed Sullivan Show, Playboy After Dark, and The Andy Williams Show. The duo released two albums in 1970, Come Together and Workin' Together. Their cover of "I Want to Take You Higher" peaked at No. 34 on the Hot 100, whereas the original by Sly and the Family Stone had peaked at No. 38. The Come Together and Workin' Together albums marked a turning point in their careers in which they switched from their usual R&B repertoire to incorporate more rock tunes such as "Come Together", "Honky Tonk Woman", and "Get Back".
Turner's success continued when she traveled to Australia to star opposite Mel Gibson in the 1985 post-apocalyptic film Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome. The movie provided her with her first acting role in ten years; she portrayed the glamorous Aunty Entity, the ruler of Bartertown. Upon release, critical response to her performance was generally positive. The film was a global success, grossing more than $36 million in the United States. Turner later received the NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Actress for her role in the film. She recorded two songs for the film, "We Don't Need Another Hero (Thunderdome)" and "One of the Living"; both became hits, with the latter winning her a Grammy Award for Best Female Rock Vocal Performance. In July 1985, Turner performed at Live Aid alongside Mick Jagger. Their performance shocked observers when Jagger ripped her skirt off. Turner released a duet, "It's Only Love", with Bryan Adams. It was nominated for a Grammy Award, and the music video won an MTV Video Music Award for Best Stage Performance.
In December 2016 Turner announced that she had been working on Tina, a musical based on her life story, in collaboration with Phyllida Lloyd and Stage Entertainment. The show opened at the Aldwych Theatre in London in April 2018 with Adrienne Warren in the lead role. Warren reprised her role on Broadway in the fall of 2019.
Turner received the 2018 Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award and her second memoir, My Love Story, was released in October 2018. In 2020, she came out of retirement to collaborate with Norwegian producer Kygo on a remix of "What's Love Got to Do with It". With this release, she became the first artist to have a top 40 hit in seven consecutive decades in the UK.
After his death on December 12, 2007, Tina Turner issued a brief statement through her spokesperson: "Tina hasn't had any contact with Ike in more than 30 years. No further comment will be made." Tina's sister Alline still considered Ike her brother-in-law and attended his funeral. Phil Spector criticized Tina Turner at the funeral. In 2018, Tina Turner told The Sunday Times that "as an old person, I have forgiven him, but I would not work with him. He asked for one more tour with me, and I said, 'No, absolutely not.' Ike wasn't someone you could forgive and allow him back in."
Turner revealed in her 2018 memoir My Love Story that she had multiple life-threatening illnesses. She had had high blood pressure since 1978, which remained mostly untreated, and resulted in damage to her kidneys and eventual kidney failure. In 2013, three weeks after her wedding to Erwin Bach, she had a stroke and needed to learn to walk again. In 2016, she was diagnosed with intestinal cancer. She attempted to treat her health problems with homeopathy, which worsened her condition.
She was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a duo with Ike Turner in 1991. In 2005, Turner received the prestigious Kennedy Center Honors. President George W. Bush commented on her "natural skill, the energy and sensuality", and referred to her legs as "the most famous in show business". Several artists paid tribute to her that night including Melissa Etheridge (performing "River Deep – Mountain High"), Queen Latifah (performing "What's Love Got to Do with It"), Beyoncé (performing "Proud Mary"), and Al Green (performing "Let's Stay Together"). Oprah Winfrey stated, "We don't need another hero. We need more heroines like you, Tina. You make me proud to spell my name w-o-m-a-n." In 2021, Turner was inducted by Angela Bassett into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a solo artist. Keith Urban and H.E.R. performed "It's Only Love", Mickey Guyton performed "What's Love Got to Do with It", and Christina Aguilera performed "River Deep – Mountain High".
Education
Tina Turner attended Flagg Grove Elementary School from first to eighth grade in Nutbush and later attended Carver High School in Brownsville. Her early life involved singing in the church choir at Nutbush's Spring Hill Baptist Church.
Bullock was African American, but she believed she had a significant amount of Native American ancestry until she participated in the PBS series African American Lives 2 with Henry Louis Gates Jr. Gates shared her genealogical DNA test estimates and traced her family timeline.
In 2013, Turner applied for Swiss citizenship, stating she would renounce her citizenship in the United States. The stated reasons for the relinquishment were that she no longer had any strong connections to the United States and "has no plans to reside" there in the future. In April, she undertook a mandatory citizenship test which included advanced knowledge of German (the official language of the canton of Zurich) 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 relinquish her American citizenship at the US embassy in Bern on October 24, 2013.
* 2015: The Tina Turner Museum at Flagg Grove School proved once again that it truly is Simply The Best addition to Tennessee Tourism winning nine awards at The Tennessee Association of Museums Conference. In a ceremony at Discovery Park of America
* 2021: Turner received an honorary doctorate for her "unique musical and artistic life's work" from the Philosophical and Historical Faculty of the University of Bern.
