2023 – R.I.P. – Tina Turner
………………………………………1……….(ignore April 30, 2017 publish date – this was published on May 25, 2023)
Tina Turner died yesterday. What a great woman to photograph! What a great singer and collaborator!
I was fortunate to get to photograph her in a half-dozen situations between 1981 and 1985:
1. November 5, 1981 – Tina was the opening act for the Rolling Stones at the Brendan Byrne Arena in East Rutherford, NJ:
2. Later that night, she joined the Stones onstage for “Honky Tonk Women” (leadoff pic and this one):
3. On June 1, 1984, she was the opening act for Lionel Richie at the same venue. It was the sexiest I ever saw her:
For some reason, I sold a lot of pix to magazines from this show. 😉
4. Once again, she joined the headliner and his band onstage:
5. On September 14, 1984, she gave the photographers their money’s worth…………bad choice of words – we didn’t pay anything…………she made it worth our while – unlike some of the stiffs that were paraded past us – to photograph her at the first MTV Video Music Awards show at Radio City Music Hall in NYC:
6.The last time I had the privilege of photographing her was on August 2, 1985 when she headlined at Madison Square Garden.
Those wigs just kept on getting bigger and bigger, but somehow always fit her just right:
Close shots up the nose are usually big no-no’s, but I’ll excuse this one. It’s got her face, mic, both arms and hands and other goodies, but nothing’s blocking anything else:
I’ll finish up this mini-tribute with an interesting shot of her picking a name out of thin air:
Nothing new there…………I always felt like I won something every time I got to photograph her.
Boy, will SHE be missed!
LATE ADDITION
It figures……………something always pops into your head after you think you’re finished.
There’s an amazing cover of “River Deep, Mountain High” that starts off a 55-year-old album by a group whose singer was primarily known for his strong voice during the British Invasion period. Contained within the song is a little “TinaTinaTinaTina……….” vocal tribute.
This is a great album with a whole variety of cool music called “Love Is” and you might want to smoke some wine or sip some weed and listen to the entire thing on your headphones. But since today isn’t 55 years ago, it’s also great straight.
You can hear the full album right here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FEnDc5qRB6Y
I’ve always recommended this album, but few people – if any – seem to be aware of it.
Oh Bob, these are WONDERFUL… Thanks for sharing!! Heartbreaking that the world lost this incredible icon…
amazing shots Bob!!
Great photos, Bob. Thanks for sharing your memories.
Beautiful shots! An amazing woman and singer. Thank you for sharing these🎉
Wonderful shots Bob!