King Charles III has honoured the late Tina Turner through a show-stopping performance by the Band of the Welsh Guards.
The legendary singer died on Wednesday (24 May) at the age of 83 after a long illness.
On Friday (26 May), the King gave the Welsh Guards permission to perform her 1989 song “The Best” during the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace.
A clip shared by Forces News via Twitter showed the group, who were joined by the First Battalion Welsh Guards Corps of Drums, playing the tune in the sun to delighted onlookers.
The King and Turner first met in 1986, when she put on a show at the Prince’s Trust All-Star Rock Concert at Wembley Stadium.
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The song played by the Welsh Guards was close to the Prince of Wales’s heart, as it reminds him of his mother, the late Princess Diana.
In December 2021, Prince William opened up about what the singer’s music meant to him during an episode of Apple audio experience Time to Walk.
He said Diana would play “The Best” for him and Prince Harry in the car when driving them to school.
“One of the songs I massively remember and has stuck with me all this time, and I still, to this day, still quite enjoy secretly, is Tina Turner’s ‘The Best’ because sitting in the backseat, singing away, it felt like a real family moment,” the prince recalled.
“And my mother, she’d be driving along, singing at the top of her voice. When I listen to it now, it takes me back to those car rides and brings back lots of memories of my mother.”
The statement shared by the “What’s Love Got To Do With It” singer’s representative said: “With her, the world loses a music legend and a role model… With her music and her inexhaustible vitality, Tina Turner thrilled millions of fans and inspired many artists of subsequent generations.”
It has been confirmed that Tina died of natural causes. She was diagnosed with intestinal cancer in 2016 and received a kidney transplant, donated by her husband Erwin Bach, in 2017.
