Tina Turner explained why she renounced her American citizenship and moved away
Topics: Celebrity, Music, Tina Turner
Ali Condon
Featured Image Credit: CNN
Topics: Celebrity, Music, Tina Turner
Around the world, Tina Turner is being remembered as one of the greatest rock legends of all time following her devastating passing.
It's well known that Tina was a musical powerhouse and the Queen of Rock and Roll - but it's a little lesser known that Turner officially renounced her US citizenship a few years ago before making the permanent move to Switzerland.
When the 'Proud Mary' singer realised how much bigger she was in Europe than in the States, she decided to roll with it.
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Not only that, but it would seem that love really was to do with it, since Tina's partner Erwin Bach - a German music producer and former executive of EMI - made the decision to move a whole lot easier.
In a recently resurfaced interview with the late Larry King filmed in 1997, Tina explained why she had fallen in love with Europe.
"I have left America because my success was in another country and my boyfriend was in another country," she told King.
"'Private Dancer' was the beginning of my success in England and basically Europe has been very supportive of my music."
When Larry asks her to clarify: "More than America?", Tina simply replies: "Yes. Yes, hugely."
Larry then argues that Tina is a 'superstar' in America, to which Tina hits back: "Not as big as Madonna! I'm as big as Madonna in Europe. I'm as big as, in some places, the Rolling Stones."
"I went to England for a couple of years. And then I met a man [that'd be Erwin] and I lived three years with him in his country in Germany. Then I bought a house in a main town in the South of France and I've started to rebuild that, so I'm in and out of there."
But home, she explained, was Zurich, Switzerland.
"Because my boyfriend moved there to run a company and I always wanted to go to Switzerland. I was very happy."
And, it would seem that she stayed happy, too, since it wasn't long before the couple did make things official - their relationship and her citizenship.
Turner and Bach wed in 2013, shortly after which, the 'Private Dancer' singer renounced her American citizenship and became a Swiss national.
After news of Tina's passing broke, flowers and candles were laid outside of Tina and Erwin's Zurich villa.
Swiss President Alain Berset was one of the countless names who paid tribute to Turner following her devastating loss, tweeting that his 'thoughts are with the relatives of this impressive woman, who found her second homeland in Switzerland."