Tina Turner's Real Name: Anna Mae Bullock

Quick answer: Tina Turner was born Anna Mae Bullock on November 26, 1939, in Brownsville, Tennessee. As the "Queen of Rock 'n' Roll," she had hits with Ike Turner and later on her own, including "What's Love Got to Do With It." She died on May 24, 2023, at 83, after a long illness at her home in Küsnacht, near Zurich, Switzerland (AP; Library of Congress).

Real name and early life

The Associated Press obituary says she "was born Anna Mae Bullock in a segregated Tennessee hospital." Britannica also lists Anna Mae Bullock as her original name. The Library of Congress name authority files her as "Turner, Tina." It records the variants "Bullock, Anna Mae" and "Bullock, Annie Mae," plus the early stage credit "Little Ann." One LOC citation notes that a source "gives her birthdate variously as 1938 or 1939"; Britannica and AP's age at death support 1939.

Britannica says she grew up in a sharecropping family in rural Tennessee and began singing as a teenager. After moving to St. Louis, she met Ike Turner in 1956 at a show by his band, the Kings of Rhythm. According to the BBC, it was Ike who changed her name to Tina Turner, without her knowledge.

Career highlights

The Ike and Tina Turner Revue was famous for its live shows. "A Fool in Love" reached the pop charts in 1960, and later hits included "River Deep—Mountain High," "Proud Mary," and "Nutbush City Limits." The BBC notes that "Nutbush" was about the small town where she was born.

In her memoir I, Tina, she described years of abuse by Ike, as AP recounts. She divorced him in 1978. In her 40s she became a solo superstar with "What's Love Got to Do With It," "We Don't Need Another Hero," and a cover of Al Green's "Let's Stay Together."

AP reports that she sold more than 150 million records worldwide and won 12 Grammys. She was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame with Ike in 1991 and on her own in 2021, and she received Kennedy Center Honors in 2005. Her life inspired the 1993 film What's Love Got to Do With It, a Broadway musical, and a 2021 HBO documentary.

The BBC says she married German music executive Erwin Bach in 2013, lived in Switzerland, and took Swiss citizenship. Bach donated a kidney to her in 2017.

Name notes for searchers

Turner is her first husband's surname, and "Tina" was a stage name he chose for her. Older records spell her first name as "Annie Mae," and she was billed early on as "Little Ann."