With the passing of Tina Turner on May 24 to a place that surely awaits the world’s most beloved entertainers, this month’s column is brimming with celebration and sadness. How to reconcile losing the ones we love? The heart cries out: Let’s Stay Together.

An Inspiring Role Model

Tina has always been there, an inspirational woman that shows you can beat a bad situation, using your talent, energy, and perseverance to overcome the immense forces that make it hard for a woman to get ahead on her own. I saw Tina portray kick-ass, powerful women in movie roles like the post-apocalyptic tougher-than-a-rocket-launcher ruler in Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, Aunty Entity. (And check out Roger Ebert’s description of her performance as the Gypsy Acid Queen in The Who’s Tommy.) But her own story is even more remarkable, as we all know.

Millions of people saw the biopic based on her autobiography (I Tina: My Life Story), What’s Love Got to Do With It, and some of us lucky ones got to see the Tony award-winning Broadway musical Tina (for which she provided input for the book and choreography). These both did a fantastic job of encapsulating her early success with Ike, the abuse, her breaking away, and the incredible struggle it took for her to re-emerge as the Queen of Rock ’n’ Roll in the early years of MTV with her killer multi-platinum 1984 album Private Dancer. (Did you know Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits wrote the title track? I didn’t!) Her music videos “What’s Love Got to Do With It” (filmed by the Brooklyn Bridge with Manhattan in the background) and “You Better Be Good to Me” created an indelible impression of how a woman can be both tough and sexy, call her own shots, and have fun with life.

A Beloved World-Record Performer

Even though my friends were all blown away by her music videos, we didn’t know at the time that with Private Dancer Tina had created an innovative fusion of R&B with new wave pop and made the biggest comeback of all time. She won three Grammy awards in 1985 for this achievement.

During her Break Every Rule World Tour in 1988, she set a then-Guinness World Record for the largest paying audience (180,000) for a solo performer, at the Maracanã Stadium in Rio de Janeiro. Can you imagine that? Performing for that many people at once, and holding them all spell-bound?

The New York Times obituary said Tina Turner also held the world record in 2000 for the most tickets ever sold by a solo performer: “After her ‘Twenty Four Seven’ tour in 2000 sold more than $100 million in tickets, Guinness World Records announced that she had sold more concert tickets than any other solo performer in history.” Wowwww!!! She was the first woman and first black performer on the cover of the Rolling Stone—on its second issue ever, in November 1967!

Electrifying!

Tina achieved many firsts, awards, and tremendous accomplishments, and her energy was beyond compare. During her 50th anniversary 2009 tour, at the age of 69, she kept up her pace night after night for six months, on average performing every second night, putting on an incendiary two-hour show with the strongest voice and charisma of her career, all the dance moves, and the decades of stage experience to keep the all-ages audience in the palm of her hand and singing along on all the songs. That’s an indominatable force of nature. Her fans were truly as ardent as ever—it was the 17^th-highest grossing tour of the decade.

She performed with an aliveness and joy that ignited these feelings in other people. An electrifying dancer and singer, Tina had a talent for choosing songs that people would relate to and like to sing along with. But I think it was her incredible triumph over so many challenges that made people love her so much. Knowing her personal story made people feel they knew her and she knew them too. In concert in Amsterdam in 1996 she asked the audience, “Do you love me?” The roar was YES!!, and she said “I love you too.” She had the remarkable ability to connect so that people felt the shine of her glory in themselves and the whole audience rode on a wave of collective love.

It wasn’t until her death that I found out how truly amazing this woman was. This makes her loss all the harder. I watched the concert of her 2009 tour, and also of her 1996 tour. If anything she was even more energetic, sexy, and confident at age 69, on the 2009 tour. In her barn-burning 10-minute version of Proud Mary, she said “We like to do it… we like to do it… and we like to do it nice and… ROUGH!” And holy cow but that was a sex thunderstorm of magnetism, attitude, joy, and female power each time she growled ROUGH and charged the stage with her dancers!

Celebrating Tina on West 14th Street

But how to celebrate the incomparable Ms. Tina Turner? The first thing I thought was, “I’m going to wear my Tina Turner wig!” (Of course I would!) I did some research on her music videos and iconic photos, and decided to wear a fringey shimmy-dress, fishnet stockings, and my sparkliest blue lace-up booties. This outfit is a bit of a hybrid of different elements she wore at different times, with the boots capturing more of the spirit of Tina than the actual footwear she wore on stage—though she always wore high heels—check out Tina dancing up on a crane in her high heels at age 69 to get closer to the audience while singing Nutbush City Limits!

Wigs and Then Some

Since Tina wasn’t known to hang out in our ’hood, I thought the best place to go to celebrate her spirit would be Wigs and Plus at 37 West 14th Street, where I purchased the aforementioned wig. You can shop online and pick up your wig in-store, or shop  in-store and get personal wig fitting.

Maybe you’ve walked by WAP (if I may so abbreviate it!) a zillion times and never gone in, but you like to make sure it’s still there—a reassuring signpost that the 32-year-old business is still available to provide all manner of women’s beauty aids. As they say on their website, “We’ve succeeded in meeting our clients’ beauty and fashion needs for over 30 years, including those who are going through chemo-therapy and experiencing hair loss. We are THE one-stop shop for fashionable hair pieces, extensions and accessories during Fashion Week, Wigstock, and Halloween!”

OK, what, Wigstock? Why haven’t I heard about this!? (Turns out it was before my time in NYC, but I’m definitely going to check out the documentary.)

I’ve worn 9 wigs in my columns.

Plus I’ve colored my own hair every shade of red, as well as blonde, brunette, orange, pink, blue, and yellow. So let’s just say, I’m a fan of WAP. They really do have the Plus—like the best assortment of fun hair colors, a wide range of specialty hair products, as well as makeup, nail care, and accessories. If you live in the ’hood and you’ve never been in, consider it your personal duty to go in there and buy something. Keep this fantastic business going! Be sure to head to the back of the store and be gob-smacked by the wigs! The Rolling Stone’s Some Girls album cover has nothin’ on this place!

Channeling Tina

I had the motivation, the outfit, the wig, the venue. But when we arrived at WAP on a hot June Saturday afternoon, I had nothin’. After all the prep, I couldn’t feel Tina in my soul. I felt like a stick. Amy bought some shampoo and Phil and I tried a few shots to check the lighting, but I just couldn’t feel the power of Tina. Then Phil had the brilliant idea of pulling up a song on his phone.

It was Tina singing “(Simply) the Best.” I held his phone to my ear, and started dancing and singing along on the sidewalk, and there she was, shaking my fringes and bringing bliss into my heart. Blessings, Tina. I know you’re feeling bliss out there somewhere.

Part of this article appeared in The Village Sun.

Style Notes

• Tina Turner wig, Lacey Costume Wig of New York Collection. Wigs and Plus, 37 West 14th St.
• Moflora black fringed backless minidress with spaghetti straps. Amazon.
• Electric blue Pleaser Adore sparkly 7″ platform booties. Hustler Hollywood. 41 W. 8th Street.
• Silver leather jacket. Loan from a fella-fashinista friend.