Always Tina Tribute Tina Turner
Always Tina
An intimate evening with the world class Tina Turner Tribute, Always Tina. June 19 at Campus Jax Newport Beach. Feel the pulse pounding, foot stompin’ dynamite tribute to the Queen of Rock, Tina Turner!
Tina Turner (born Anna Mae Bullock; November 26, 1939 – May 24, 2023) was a singer, songwriter, actress, and author. Dubbed the “Queen of Rock ‘n’ Roll“, she broke both racial and gender barriers in rock music and became a dominant figure in popular culture. Known for her vocal prowess and stage presence, Turner is one of the best-selling music artists of all time, with estimated sales of over 100 million records worldwide.
Turner rose to prominence in the 1960s as the lead vocalist of the husband-wife duo Ike & Tina Turner, known for their explosive live performances with the Ikettes and Kings of Rhythm.[6] After years of marital abuse, she ended her personal and professional relationship with Ike Turner in the 1970s and embarked on a solo career. She made a comeback with her multi-platinum fifth solo album Private Dancer (1984), whose single “What’s Love Got to Do with It” won the Grammy Award for Record of the Year and became her only number-one hit on the Billboard Hot 100. Her worldwide chart success continued with the Top 10 singles “Better Be Good to Me“, “Private Dancer“, “We Don’t Need Another Hero (Thunderdome)“, “Typical Male“, and “I Don’t Wanna Fight“.
Turner’s Break Every Rule World Tour became the highest-grossing tour by a female artist of the 1980s and set a Guinness World Record for the then-largest paying audience in a concert (180,000).[7] Her success as a live performer continued with the Wildest Dreams Tour, the first tour by a woman to earn $100 million, and the Twenty Four Seven Tour, the highest-grossing tour of 2000.[8]In 2009, she retired from performing after completing the Tina!: 50th Anniversary Tour. As an actress, Turner appeared in the feature films Tommy (1975), Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (1985) and Last Action Hero (1993). Her life was dramatized in the biographical film What’s Love Got to Do with It (1993), based on her autobiography I, Tina: My Life Story (1986). She was also the subject of the jukebox musical Tina (2018) and the documentary film Tina (2021).
Turner received 12 Grammy Awards, including a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award and three Grammy Hall of Fame inductions. Rolling Stone ranked her among the greatest artists and greatest singers of all time. She was the first black artist and first woman to appear on the cover of Rolling Stone[9] and was the first female black artist to win an MTV Award.[10] Turner has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. She was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame along with Ike Turner in 1991 and was later inducted as a solo artist in 2021. Turner was also a 2005 recipient of the Kennedy Center Honors.[11] In 2013, Turner relinquished her U.S. citizenship and became a citizen of Switzerland, where she died in Küsnacht in 2023.
Early life
Turner was born Anna Mae Bullock[b][1][2] on November 26, 1939, in Brownsville, Tennessee.[12][13][14][15] She was the youngest daughter of Floyd Richard Bullock and his wife Zelma Priscilla (née Currie).[12][16] The family lived in the rural unincorporated community of Nutbush, Tennessee, where Bullock’s father worked as an overseer of the sharecroppers at Poindexter Farm on Highway 180; she later recalled picking cotton with her family at an early age.[17][18] Bullock was African American. She believed she had a significant amount of Native American ancestry until she participated in the PBS series African American Lives 2 with Henry Louis Gates Jr.;[19][20] Gates shared her genealogical DNA test estimates and traced her family timeline.[21]
Bullock had two older sisters, Evelyn Juanita Currie and Ruby Alline Bullock, a songwriter.[22] She was the first cousin once removed of bluesman Eugene Bridges.[23] As young children, the three sisters were separated when their parents relocated to Knoxville, Tennessee, to work at a defense facility during World War II.[18] Bullock went to stay with her strict, religious paternal grandparents, Alex and Roxanna Bullock, who were deacon and deaconess at the Woodlawn Missionary Baptist Church.[18][24]
After the war, the sisters reunited with their parents and moved with them to Knoxville.[18] Two years later, the family returned to Nutbush to live in the Flagg Grove community, where Bullock attended Flagg Grove Elementary School from first through eighth grade.[25][26] As a young girl, Bullock enjoyed singing and acting, and she often performed in the streets for change so she could go to the movies.[27] She sang in the church choir at Nutbush’s Spring Hill Baptist Church.[28][29]
In 1950, when Bullock was 11, her mother Zelma left the family without warning, seeking freedom from her abusive relationship with Floyd by relocating to St. Louis.[30] Two years after her mother left the family, her father married another woman and moved to Detroit. Bullock and her sisters were sent to live with their maternal grandmother, Georgeanna Currie, in Brownsville, Tennessee.[30] She stated in her autobiography I, Tina that she felt her parents did not love her and that she was not wanted.[31] Zelma had planned to leave Floyd but stayed once she became pregnant.[32] Bullock recalled: “She was a very young woman who didn’t want another kid.”[32]
As a teenager, Bullock worked as a domestic worker for the Henderson family in Ripley, Tennessee.[33] She was at the Henderson house when she was notified that her half-sister Evelyn had died in a car crash alongside her cousins Margaret Currie and Vela Evans, however Evans survived the car crash with injuries.[34][35] A self-professed tomboy, Bullock joined both the cheerleading squad and the female basketball team at Carver High School in Brownsville, and “socialized every chance she got”.[17][30]
When Bullock was 16, her grandmother died, so she went to live with her mother in St. Louis. She graduated from Sumner High School in 1958.[36] After high school, Bullock worked as a nurse’s aide at Barnes-Jewish Hospital.[37]
Shar Wils as “Tina”
Shar Wils has performed her celebrated singing and dancing shows all over the world. She has entertained at numerous casinos, clubs, hotels, theaters and resorts including in Hong Kong, Tokyo, Bangkok, Singapore, Bahrain, Toronto, and many more.
Her unique talent has been presented on “Entertainment Tonight” and “The People’s Choice Awards.” She has also been a featured guest artist in several Las Vegas productions and has performed at a wide variety of venues including The Hippodrome in London and Madison Square Garden in New York.
Russ Olsen
GUITAR/VOCALS
Russ has been slinging guitars on stage with bands ever since grade school. He attributes the Rolling Stones as an early influence. He has played all over the world in various pro original and tribute bands. He loves the passion and drive that “Tina” brings to her performances. He is committed to re-creating that same passion on stage each and every night.
Marvin Sperling
BASS/VOCALS
Marvin is one half of the hardest working rhythm sections in rock. He has laid the foundation for many top notch rock bands. When asked why he plays bass, “I like the way bass can move people to tap their feet and get up and dance.”
Sam Cunningham
DRUMS/PERCUSSION/VOCALS
Sam has been pounding on things ever since he beat the side of his crib for attention. That was the beginning of his passion for all things drums. He is a much sought after drummer in the Los Angeles area music scene. I dare you to remain seated when he gets going!!
