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Topics: Celebrity, Health, Music, News, Tina Turner
Joe Harker
Topics: Celebrity, Health, Music, News, Tina Turner
The world of music has gathered to mourn the legendary Tina Turner after her death at the age of 83.
The singer, best known for such hits like 'Simply the Best' and 'What's Love Got To Do With It', had her passing confirmed by her publicist, leading many to pay tribute to the icon.
Selling over 100 million records around the world and picking up a dozen Grammy awards over a sparkling career, she was sometimes referred to as 'The Queen of Rock and Roll'.
She leaves behind her husband, German music executive, Erwin Bach, the man she credits with helping her find true love after she suffered abuse at the hands of first husband, Ike Turner.
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Tina said Ike 'instilled fear' in her and struck her on multiple occasions. In his autobiography, Ike Turner admitted that he'd 'slapped Tina' and 'punched her to the ground'.
It was her second marriage to Bach that gave Tina the true love of her life and they spent 37 years together.
Their relationship began in 1986, when record label EMI sent music executive Bach to Dusseldorf Airport to greet her upon her arrival, and they hit it off pretty much instantly.
He was there to deliver her a gift from the record label, a Mercedes Jeep, but she was more interested in Erwin as she described their meeting as 'love at first sight' in her autobiography My Love Story.
She wrote: "My heart suddenly started to beat BOOM, BOOM, BOOM, drowning out all other sounds. My hands were ice-cold.
"So this is what they call love at first sight, I thought. Oh my God, I am not ready for this."
Later that year, they were confirmed to be dating and had been together ever since, though it took them 27 years into their relationship to tie the knot, with Tina and Erwin marrying in 2013.
A few years after their marriage, Tina became seriously ill to the point where she had just survived intestinal cancer and a stroke when doctors told her that her kidneys were failing.
She didn't want to go on dialysis as she didn't wish to 'live on a machine', and had even signed up to an assisted suicide service as she began to think she might die.
Her only option for survival was looking like getting a transplant and it was here that Erwin stepped up and donated one of his kidneys to his wife.
Turner wrote in My Love Story that Erwin told her he 'didn't want another woman, or another life' and was prepared to donate one of his organs to her so she could survive.
Testing confirmed that he was a viable donor for his wife and in April 2017, the couple went into surgery to transplant one of Erwin's kidneys into Tina.
"The best moment was when Erwin came rolling into my room in his wheelchair," Tina wrote of the moment they reunited after the life saving surgery.
"He somehow managed to look good, even handsome, as he greeted me with an energetic: 'Hi, darling!' I was so emotional - happy, overwhelmed and relieved that we'd come through this alive."