Luisa Marshall's TINA: A Rock 'n' Roll Journey

Reviewer Ed Farolan

Tribute artist Luisa Marshall made fans of Tina Turner stand up and dance with her closing number, "Proud Mary" during opening night performance. Everyone was "rolling down the river" and clapping in unison as Marshall, her dancers and her band played this favourite classic.

The show was a musical biography of rock icon Tina Turner, going back to her beginnings in the 60s all the way to her last concerts, a period covering more than four decades. All throughout the two-hour show, images were displayed on a backdrop screen showing her journey. Her first song, "Nutbush", derives from her origins. She was born to a share-cropping family in Nutbush (now renamed Brownsville) in Tennessee, the segregated South of the USA during that time. The powerpoint images of black and white pictures of the town projected on the screen informed us that she was born as Anna Mae Bullock,and in one particular picture, a sign displaying the proud slogan, "Birthplace of Tina Turner".

The next slides showed us her move to St. Louis where a whole new world of R&B nightclubs opened up to this teenager.She started singing on-stage with a band called Kings of Rhythm led by later-to-be husband Ike Turner. Her first hit single which Marshall sang as slides of Ike and Tina were being projected was "A Fool In Love". Afterwards, Tina became a permanent fixture in Ike's band.

The show was an almost perfect Tina Turner concert, with gorgeous costume changes (including wigs), since this rock 'n roll journey covered almost 50 years of her life. The concert included signature songs of Tina: "What's Love Got To Do With It" (which was Number One in the charts in 1984), "Help" and "Let's Stay Together". Her album "Private Dancer" was recorded the same year. The performance of this song was quite sensual with Marshall's dancers doing "dirty dancing".

This was followed by another number one hit single "We Don't Need Another Hero", the theme song of Mad Max, a film she co-starred with Mel Gibson in 1985. I like this song, and Marshall delivered it to a Tina Turner T (forgive my campy alliteration).

Marshall exuded the charisma of Tina Turner in this concert. Like Tina, she conversed with the audience, even coming down and singing with one of the audience members. The spectacle and glamour that makes Tina Turner the Queen of Rock 'n Roll .will live forever so long as we have performers like Luisa Marshall keeping her alive in our memories with concerts such as this one.

. © 2009 Ed Farolan