If you are a fan of music, there is a big chance you love both Tina Turner and Cher. Both singers have mammoth careers and beyond the stage, the women make sure to support one another as well. Cher and Tina Turner shared a deep and rare connection.
Now, Cher is sharing details about her last visit to Tina Turner before the singer passed, and what she reveals is both heartbreaking and heartwarming. Keep reading to learn more.
After Tina Turner’s death on Wednesday, singer Cher called in to give an interview and remember her late friend. She gave details of the last time she visited Turner while the singer was battling an illness.
She explained how she had decided to prioritize friendships saying, “I started going to visit her because I thought, ‘I need to put this time into our friendship, so she knows we haven’t forgotten her,.” She added, “So we all took turns going and spending time with her and it made her happy.”
While Turner’s cause of death is yet to be revealed and confirmed to the public, Cher did mention the singer “had her dialysis machine in her house.” Dialysis is usually used on people who have kidney failure or end-stage renal disease. Tina famously had a kidney transplant in 2017, with the kidney donated from her husband Erwin Bach.
“She fought this sickness for such a long time and she was so strong as you think she would be, but I know towards the end, she told me once, she said, ‘I’m really ready. I just don’t want to put up with this anymore,’” Cher said of her friend.
But Cher noted that Turner “was really happy” nonetheless. She chronicled the first time she visited her friend in her home in Switzerland.
“She said, ‘I can’t spend too much time,’ and then five hours later we were laughing like crazy and she wanted to get up and show everything she bought in the house,” the singer said. “… She was having a good time in spite of the fact that she was really sick and not wanting people to know about it.”
On Cher’s last visit, the singer revealed that she did not leave empty handed as Turner handed her old-time friend a gift. “She gave me a pair of shoes the last time I saw her. What kind of shoes? Tina Turner shoes!” Cher added. “The big high heels that she just [walked] around in like they were nothing.”
The two women had met when Tina Turner was still married to Ike Turner. The marriage was famously abusive towards Tina and lasted from 1962 to 1978.
“When I first knew her, she was still with Ike,” Cher recalled. “It was very strange to see her with Ike and afterward. I was so thrilled, because afterward, she was so free. You could just see her being able to take a big breath. Her new life was like a big, fresh breath.”
She said the two of them got closer to one another after Tina left Ike. Cher said of it, “really got close once she left Ike, then we started spending time together.”
Cher remembered her friend in kind words and applauded her spirit till the very end. “She was such a force. Honestly, I think she just hit everything head-on… She wasn’t about to stop. She might not have won every battle, but she fought every war. She was there fighting for all the things she believed in,” Cher said. “… She’s one of the great artists in our generation, in rock and roll. There was no other person like her. There’s no other person who could come close to who she was.”
Cher is understandably heartbroken due to the loss and said the two women were “perfect friends for each other.” Cher added how the two of them gave each other strength through different points in their lives, “She gave me lots of strength sometimes, and I gave her lots of strength too.”
Tina Turner’s representation confirmed the news that the legendary singer died peacefully in her sleep in her home in Küsnacht near Zurich, Switzerland. The statement was later uploaded to Turner’s official Instagram account to notify fans.
“It is with great sadness that we announce the passing of Tina Turner. With her music and her boundless passion for life, she enchanted millions of fans around the world and inspired the stars of tomorrow,” the statement read. “Today we say goodbye to a dear friend who leaves us all her greatest work: her music. All our heartfelt compassion goes out to her family. Tina, we will miss you dearly.”
This is such heartbreaking news. Tina Turner was the voice of a generation and paved the way for women especially African American women in the music industry. May she rest in peace!
Please share this article with other fans of these singers so they can also cherish the warm friendship the two of them shared.
