I don’t like to dwell on the past,” Tina Turner said, whenever she was asked to retell the story of her loveless childhood and the long, abusive marriage she fled in 1976. She’d prefer we remember her as a “rock goddess”, the first Black artist to appear on the cover of Rolling Stone magazine in 1967, and the first woman over 40 to top the Billboard charts in 1984. “But I get cards, letters… People said I gave them hope. I have to pass that on.”
If the singer, who died on Wednesday aged 83, feared being remembered as a victim, then those fears were unfounded. Because it’s her mighty roar of survival and triumph that fans will continue to celebrate. Each night in London, audiences rise to their feet as they watch her story retold in Tina: The Musical. A theatrical event that the star initially resisted but eventually blessed, rocking up to rehearsals, aged 79, to show actors half a century younger how to perfect her super-strutter dance moves. Turner had sweat so hard that the wardrobe department fetched her a fresh blouse.
