'Queen of rock 'n' roll' Tina Turner dies aged 83

Tina Turner, the American-born singer who left a hardscrabble farming community and abusive relationship to become one of the top recording artists of all time, has died at the age of 83.

She died peacefully after a long illness in her home in Kusnacht near Zurich, Switzerland, her representative said on Wednesday.

Turner began her career in the 1950s during the early years of rock and roll and evolved into an MTV phenomenon.

In the video for her chart-topping song "What 's Love Got to Do with It," in which she called love a "second-hand emotion," Turner epitomised 1980s style as she strutted through New York City streets with her spiky blond hair, wearing a cropped jean jacket, mini skirt, and stiletto heels.

With her taste for musical experimentation and bluntly worded ballads, Turner gelled perfectly with a 1980s pop landscape in which music fans valued electronically produced sounds and scorned hippie-era idealism.

Sometimes nicknamed the "Queen of Rock 'n' Roll," Turner won six of her eight Grammy Awards in the 1980s.

The decade saw her land a dozen songs on the Top 40, including "Typical Male," "The Best," "Private Dancer" and "Better Be Good to Me."

Her 1988 show in Rio de Janeiro drew 180,000 people, which remains one of the largest concert audiences for any single performer. By then, Turner had been free from her marriage to guitarist Ike Turner for a decade.

The superstar was forthcoming about the abuse she suffered from her former husband during their marital and musical partnership in the 1960s and 1970s. She described bruised eyes, busted lips, a broken jaw and other injuries that repeatedly sent her to the emergency room.

"Tina's story is not one of victimhood but one of incredible triumph," singer Janet Jackson wrote about Turner, in a Rolling Stone issue that placed Turner at No. 63 on a list of the top 100 artists of all time.

"She's transformed herself into an international sensation – an elegant powerhouse," Jackson said. In 1985, Turner gave a fictional turn to her reputation as a survivor.

She played the ruthless leader of an outpost in a nuclear wasteland, acting opposite Mel Gibson in the third installment of the Mad Max franchise, "Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome."

Most of Turner's hit songs were written by others, but she enlivened them with a voice that New York Times music critic Jon Pareles called "one of the more peculiar instruments in pop."

"It's three-tiered, with a nasal low register, a yowling, cutting middle range and a high register so startlingly clear it sounds like a falsetto," Pareles wrote in a 1987 concert review.

'Massive loss'

Mick Jagger of the Rolling Stones said he was saddened by Turner's death, calling her "enormously talented." "She was inspiring, warm, funny and generous," Jagger wrote on Twitter.

"She helped me so much when I was young and I will never forget her."

Canadian singer Bryan Adams, who paired with Turner on the 1985 single "It's Only Love," said "the world just lost one hell of a powerhouse of a woman." "Thank you for being the inspiration to millions of people around the world, for speaking your truth and giving us the gift of your voice," Adams said on Twitter.

At the White House, spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre called Turner's death "a massive loss to the communities that loved her and certainly the music industry. Her music will continue to live on."

Turner was born Anna Mae Bullock on November 26, 1939, in the rural Tennessee community of Nutbush, which she described in her 1973 song "Nutbush City Limits" as a "quiet little old community, a one-horse town."

Her father worked as an overseer on a farm and her mother left the family when the singer was 11 years old, according to the singer's 2018 memoir "My Love Story."

As a teenager, she moved to St Louis to rejoin her mom.

Ike Turner, whose 1951 song "Rocket 88" has often been called the first rock and roll record, discovered her at age 17 when she grabbed the mic to sing at his club show in St Louis in 1957.

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Source: TRT World