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Bonnie Tyler, the Welsh singer whose soft but commanding voice made songs like Total Eclipse of the Heart into 1980s classics, has died aged 75.
The message on her Facebook page says: “Bonnie’s family and team are heartbroken to announce that Bonnie died suddenly last night at a hospital in Portugal due to a medical condition.
In MayTyler underwent emergency gastric bypass surgery at a hospital near Faro, Portugal, where he lived. She later fainted while trying to help him recover. He was later taken out of a coma, but a spokesman said he remained “very ill and in intensive care”.
As well as 1983’s Total Eclipse of the Heart, which reached No 1 in the US and UK and is undoubtedly a power ballad by which all others should be judged, Tyler’s hits included Holding Out for a Hero, which brought explosive panache to the Footloose soundtrack and reached No 2 in the UK charts in 1984; and Heartbreak, which gave him a breakthrough in 1977.
Born Gaynor Hopkins in the village of Skewen near Swansea, Tyler grew up in a council house with five older siblings. “I studied on my own as a working girl and I never stopped working,” he told the Guardian in 2013. “I do a lot (of sports) because I think other people would love to be given what I’m being given.”
His music career began slowly: playing original songs in local clubs while working in a store. But a talent scout heard her sing Freda Payne’s Band of Gold one evening, and booked a demo to record – two years later, RCA finally signed her, and she took the name Bonnie Tyler.
His first single was a flop, but his second, Lost in France – a swinging Francophile ball full of accordions and “ooh la las” – went into the UK Top 10, and the follow-up More Than A Lover was also a moderate hit. After a successful operation on small particles on his vocal cords – “my voice was wider than before, and it had an edge,” he later said of the procedure – then he was deeply affected by Heartache, a perfect match for his strong tone. It became his first US hit and No. 3 charting there and No. 4 in the UK.
Tyler became more versatile, bouncing between country ballads and disco-pop songs such as the 1979 hit (The World is Full of) Married Men, recorded for the film adaptation of Jackie Collins’ novel of the same name. But Tyler wanted to get into rock music, and he teamed up with Jim Steinman, who had great success as Meat Loaf’s main assistant on Bat Out of Hell and others.
Steinman was impressed with Tyler and gave him a Total Eclipse of the Heart (said to have caused jealousy in Meat Loaf later). Tyler told his girlfriend at the time: “I recorded an amazing song today. The problem is, it’s so long, I don’t think anyone’s going to sing it” – but after the seven-minute song was shortened to a radio-friendly four, it became a huge hit. With the “turning…” interference of the unconventional singer Rory Dodd, the duet shows the dissolution of a dangerous relationship, and being a favorite of karaoke and transatlantic No 1, it won the charts in Australia, Canada, Ireland and many other regions.
“Some people think the song is about a vampire, but I don’t understand what it means,” he said later. “Jim once told Playbill that he has been working on an adaptation of the silent film Nosferatu. I have always thought of Total Eclipse as an emotional love song.” The following Faster Than the Speed of Night album – including a powerful cover of John Fogerty’s Have You Ever Seen the Rain? – topped the UK Albums Chart.
Using the showmanship of his vocals, Tyler was now at the peak of his commercial career, with the uptempo Holding Out for a Hero – another Steinman song – showing a different but more dangerous side to his art. His 1984 collaboration Giorgio Moroder’s Here Comes Tyler earned Tyler his third Grammy nomination in two years; Steinman’s performance continued when he produced the 1986 album Secret Dreams and Forbidden Fire, including the hit single You Were a Woman (And I Was a Man), including a cover of his breakthrough hit, Band of Gold. The following year he appeared in the famous George Martin-helmed film of the classic Dylan Thomas Under Milk Wood, together with Tom Jones, Anthony Hopkins, Alan Bennett and others, with music by Elton John.
While his commercial success in the UK and US began to wane – although his hits continued on television – he remained a force in Western Europe, with the 1991 album Bitterblue, produced by the German artist Dieter Bohlen, which became a number one in many countries. The 1990s follow-up also did well across the country, and a bilingual remake of Total Eclipse of the Heart in 2003 with French star Kareen Antonn did well in France, spending 10 weeks at No 1.
This win made Tyler a natural choice for the UK’s Eurovision, but his 2013 effort Believe in Me didn’t catch the attention of European voters and he only took 19 out of 26 countries. “I’m sure a lot of people are disappointed in my place but I’m very happy with my experience at Eurovision,” he said later. “I did everything I could with a great song.
It helped lead to his first album since 2005, Rocks and Honey, which was a hit, and his follow-up Between the Earth and the Stars brought him back into the UK Top 40 album chart for the first time since 1986. single Together, in collaboration with Hypaton.
Starting in 1973, Tyler had a long marriage with the producer Robert Sullivan, who also represented Great Britain in judo in the 1972 Munich Olympics. They had no children, although Tyler had a miscarriage at age 39. “We just thought it wasn’t right,” Tyler said. then told the Guardian. I have a big family, I have five sons, 16 grandchildren and 12 great-grandchildren, so I don’t need children in my life.
