Tina Turner died without the fear she looked older than her husband Erwin Bach despite their 16-year age difference.
Tina Turner died without the fear she looked older than her husband Erwin Bach despite their 16-year age difference
The late ‘Private Dancer’ singer, who died on 24 May aged 83 from natural causes, married the German music producer, 67, in 2013 after ending her abusive marriage to Ike Turner, and first got serious with him when she was 46.
She said in her memoir ‘My Love Story’ about her feelings after sleeping with Erwin for the first time: “Thus began my love story with a
man who was 16 years younger than me.
“But that was never an issue in my mind, then or now. The world may view Erwin as Tina’s ‘younger man’ but the truth is that, at heart, he’s really 60 and I’m 16.
“He’s always been an old soul. And he’s much more mature than I am: he thinks ahead and exercises caution, while I’m more likely to leap without looking.
“In any case, at 46, I didn’t look older than Erwin, who was 30.
“I never think about the age difference. I don’t even feel I need to work at looking pretty in bed – I’m past that. What’s love got to do with it? A lot!”
Tina fell in love with Erwin after enduring years of beatings and verbal and mental abuse at the hands of her former music partner Ike, who died aged 76 in 2007.
But she said it took the music producer a while to check if they were a couple.
Tina added in her tell-all book: “I was already head-over-heels in love with him. For the first time, I felt that I was truly in a relationship. This is how it’s supposed to be, I told myself.
“One day, he asked me in his charming German way, ‘Are we together?’ – meaning, ‘Are we a couple?’… I just wanted to be with Erwin more and more.
Tina had a stroke the year she married Erwin, and four years later he saved her life by donating her one of his kidneys after the singer had spent decades battling issues with the organs.
She said about urging him not to go ahead with the operation: “He was a young man. Why should he take such a risk to give an older woman a few extra years? What if he had a problem some day with his remaining kidney?”
“‘Darling, you’re young. Don’t, don’t, don’t interfere with your
life. Think about your own future,’ I urged.
“But Erwin had made up his mind. ‘My future is our future,’ he told me.”
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