“I have everything”: Exploring the final years Tina Turner spent in Switzerland
When you’re one of the biggest stars in the world, finding a true escape seems unfathomable – it took Tina Turner some searching to finally uncover where she felt at home.
Considering all the struggles and strife she endured right from her upbringing in Nutbush, Tennessee, all the way up to the height of the world stage, Turner’s story was the true exemplification of the fact that fame is often far from rosy, and does not make anyone immune from tragedy or hardship in any form.
Yet from her rural upbringing in the devoutly religious grip of her family, something about Turner – or Anna Mae Bullock as she was first known – always seemed instinctively all-American… it was the country that made her, broke her, and eventually wrapped her up in their arms as their own homegrown star.
However, the reality is that this was far from the truth… What’s more, Turner was keenly aware of it, and even in the height of the stardom she had so long fought for, she pined to escape, and the stars and the stripes once pretended to promise greatness, but for her, in the end, they became more like shackles.
It was never better proven than in the 60 Minutes interview she gave in 1996, with a three-month tour of Europe being planned for that year, where she was expected to make $100 million. The journalist, Mike Wallace, was stunned – he had no concept that she was such a huge deal on the continent across the ocean.
“No one in America knows that,” Turner replied, a solemn testament to the truth she had known for quite some time.
Plainly, the US never realised the gift that they had in her presence. They robbed her for so long of the stardom she truly deserved, only to lavish it on her so forcefully when it finally arrived that it ended up coming across as insincere. But then came the protectiveness and shallow-mindedness. She was theirs and no one else’s, even though this was extremely far from the case.
What Turner actually knew to be true was the fact that Europe was the place where she was not only more popular, but where she would be treated with a greater sense of respect and certain anonymity that America could never even conceive of. In no small degree, that could also be attributed to Erwin Bach.
The German label executive who signed the singer to EMI in 1986 to launch her career comeback also morphed into her romantic soul mate, with Turner saying it was “love at first sight” from the second she set eyes on him at Düsseldorf Airport – together, just under a decade later, they moved to Switzerland, where she remained happy for the rest of her days.
The rugged country, a far cry from the glare of the stage and the scream of the fans, offered all the peace and contentment that Turner ever needed, and she felt no longing to ever return to where she came from, saying in 2019, “I have everything… When I sit at the Lake Zurich, in the house that I have, I am so serene. I have no problems.”
To overcome all the pain she suffered, let alone find that sense of contentment and block out the noise, was not testament to Turner giving up or stepping away from the life she had strived so long to build – it was a place where music and fame no longer felt the need to enter into her psyche, with her final album, Twenty Four Seven, having been released in 1999.
With the extent of health problems that she had, Switzerland was the perfectly calm backdrop where she could assess the rest of her life on her own terms. Even still, it didn’t come without its difficult moments – her sons Craig and Ronnie both tragically passed away in 2018 and 2022, respectively – but critically, she could handle that grief out of the glare of the public eye.
Ultimately, leaving the world herself on May 24th, 2023, at her home in Küsnacht, Turner left a legacy that roared like a lion on the outside, but paled into tame comparison with the life that had become familiar in the years leading up to that point. After her death, neighbours spoke of her being a quiet, friendly individual within the community.
This was not the typical mark of the ‘Queen of Rock and Roll‘, but nor did she want it to be. For the most part, Switzerland was not the place for music or letting the cameras in to a huge extent, particularly in latter years. Throughout most of her life, Turner was never one to retreat into the shadows.
But this was different. This was the peace she had finally found after a lifetime of fighting for that. Much like she had grappled for her fame in her younger days, she was not about to let that go once she got her hands on it. Turner was an icon, but behind it all, she was a woman who needed the rest from a life that had not always been kind. Switzerland was the perfect hidden chalice.
