Revisiting Tina Turner's Personal Life

Tina Turner's two very different marriages: The late singer is survived by her kids!  

Tina Turner recently passed away from a long illness on May 24, at the age of 83. Turner's passing leaves a deep void in the music industry and within her legion of fans, who she entertained and inspired with her glorious professional and personal trajectories.  

Born Anna Mae Bullock, Turner is survived by her four kids and her second husband, Erwin Bach. As celebrities, including Oprah Winfrey, Cher, and more mourned the sad, yet inevitable death of the singer, who was also a dancer, and trailblazer, many summon up Tina's magnificent decades on earth; constituting her illustrious career and her ill-fated life behind the fame.  

Tina Turner's First Marriage was Chaotic!   

Tina and her first husband, Ike Turner, were one of the most famous musical duos, Ike & Tina Turner. The pair popped and ruled the musical world throughout the 60s and 70s. Performing live as Ike & Tina Turner Revue, the musical spouses broke down racial barriers and earned fans around the world.   

But like two sides of a coin, the Turner couple's marriage also hid a side that the world didn't know about. While masquerading as the most successful musical spouses, their marriage was the worst celebrity case of domestic and emotional abuse.  

Tina and Ike were friends and members of the Ike-led group, Kings of Rhythm, for a long time. Their relationship turned romantic with a prolonged affair. Ike was dating Lorraine Turner when he started messing around with Tina. Ike's early sign of establishing control in their relationship was by changing Anna's stage name to Tina.   

The late singer reckoned Ike's violent tendencies and proposed the idea of limiting their relationship to work, upon hearing that Ike struck her with a wooden stretcher. The Fool in Love hitmaker gave birth to their son, Ronnie, in October 1960, and married her son's father in 1962. Tina had a son from her previous relationship, and Ike shared two sons with Lorraine.

The musical spouses grew even more famous, spawning millions of sold albums, all while Ike assaulted Tina behind closed doors. After years of abuse and harassment, Tina garnered the courage to leave Ike in 1976. Years after her divorce from the musician, Tina unveiled the dark truth of her marriage.   

Tina Turner is dead at 83!  

As she detailed her traumatic experience in the marriage, Tina said, "I was insanely afraid of that man." She proceeded to list many horrific incidents from the decades-long relationship, including a time when Ike took her to a brothel on their wedding night, the time when Ike threw hot coffee at her, and more.  

Tina left the marriage with several physical injuries, emotional scars, and trauma that followed her later in her life. Ike, on the other hand, went on to marry two women. Ike died from a cocaine overdose in December 2007.   

Tina Turner's Second Marriage was Blissful!  

Nothing could heal the damage her first marriage did but her second marriage, with Erwin Bach, did give the late singer a positive experience of marriage. Turner's nuptial with Bach was every bit as blissful and stable. The multiple Grammy winner met Bach, a former music executive, in 1985.   

Bach, sixteen years younger than Turner, was sent to greet the singer at Düsseldorf Airport by a European record label. Tina was instantly attracted to Erwin. The pair were friends for a year and started dating thereafter until their wedding in 2013.  

It understandably took Bach two tries before he could get Tina to say yes to his proposal. The couple's wedding ceremony, at Château Algonquin, was a civil and intimate affair. Turner spoke extensively and proudly of her second husband and their marriage, including in her 2021 HBO documentary Tina.  

Both Tina and Bach weathered some testing times during their marriage; a few years after their wedding, Tina suffered a medical catastrophe and Erwin came to the rescue by donating his kidney to his wife. "He said he didn't want another woman or another life," Tina recalled Erwin's words in her 2018 memoir, My Love Story.  

The twosome lived the rest of their lives, until Turner's death, peacefully in their serene abode in Zürich, Switzerland. While reflecting on her happy marriage with Bach, the late singer once explained how the former music executive taught her the real meaning of love.  

"He shows me that true love doesn't require the dimming of my light so that he can shine,"  the Queen of Rock 'n' Roll said. Tina and Bach didn't have any kids of their own but the singer was a doting mother of four; sadly, she lived to see the death of two of her sons.  

Tina's oldest, Craig, who she shared with Raymond Hill, died by suicide in July 2018. Ronnie, her only son with Ike, passed away from colon cancer in December 2022. The singer is now survived by her two sons, Ike Turner Jr., and Michael Turner, both born to Ike and Lorraine, but adopted by Tina after she married Ike.  

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