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Tina Turner, known for fighting through the noise and surviving domestic abuse, has passed away at the age of 83, according to a representative.
Multiple outlets, including Reuters, have reported that the trailblazing Rock n’ Roll star who soared into the pop charts in the ’80s has died after a long battle with an illness.
The “What’s Love Got To Do With It” singer and performer was diagnosed with intestinal cancer in 2016 and received a kidney transplant in 2017, according to the Guardian.
FILE – Tina Turner performs at New York’s Madison Square Garden on Aug. 1, 1985. Turner, the unstoppable singer and stage performer, died Tuesday, after a long illness at her home in Küsnacht near Zurich, Switzerland, according to her manager. She was 83.
Ray Stubblebine – staff, AP
Becoming a beacon for Black women and showcasing Black Americans’ influence on the Rock genre, Turner survived decades of abuse from her then-husband Ike before setting out on her own with the release of her album “Private Dancer” in 1984.
“Tina Turner, the ‘Queen of Rock’n Roll’ has died peacefully today at the age of 83 after a long illness in her home in Kusnacht near Zurich, Switzerland. With her, the world loses a music legend and a role model,” a representative said in a statement.
A documentary titled “Tina” was released in 2021, and Angela Bassett famously played Tina in the 1993 biopic “What’s Love Got To Do With It.”
The birth of a legend, the passing of an icon: Tina Turner
Born Anna Mae Bullock on November 26, 1939, Turner remembered picking cotton as a child in Nutbush, Tennessee. From singing in her small town’s choir, to joining Ike on the stage in Ike’s band in St. Louis, it was Ike who created the name Tina Turner. For years he attempted to control her image and her very movements, until Turner broke free from the metaphorical chains that bound her.
“My relationship with Ike was doomed the day he figured out I was going to be his moneymaker,” Turner wrote in her 2018 biography My Love Story. “He needed to control me, economically and psychologically, so I could never leave him.”
Tina Turner established the flashy, unbossed persona that many artists emulate today, proving her mark on the music industry and her memory in the hearts of millions will never disappear.