Gonna Have FunTina Turner

Tina Turner

Often dubbed the Queen of Rock & Roll, Tina Turner is arguably among the most iconic of female divas in history, with her prolific career and memorable personality as a performer and a public figure. Hailing from a small town in Tennessee, and born Anna Mae Bullock, Turner has cemented herself as one of music’s greatest entertainers.

Turner’s career in music arose from her frequenting of nightclubs near St. Louis, where she would meet her soon-to-be husband Ike Turner, who would also give her the alias “Tina”. With Ike, she would form the famous Ike And Tina Turner Revue. A dynamic, explosive R&B ensemble, the two became the definition of the genre in the late 60s and early 70s, where R&B/Soul had only tiptoed into the realms of the mainstream. A particularly influential act in popularizing the genre, the Revue went on to release some of music’s most memorable and iconic tracks – a cover of Creedence Clearwater Revival’s “Proud Mary”, the Phil Spector-penned “River Deep – Mountain High”, and the electric “Nutbush City Limits”. After a host of drug and abuse problems on Ike’s part, with the male Turner eventually engaging in a violent altercation with his wife, Tina decided to leave her husband for the solo life – and it worked.

As a solo artist, with the help of fellow artists like glam rocker David Bowie, Turner tumbled into mainstream success in the 80s with the only number-one hit of her career – the unconquerable love ballad “What’s Love Got To Do With It” as part of her debut solo album, Private Dancer.