In the ’80s, Tina Turner told her manager, “My dream is to be the first Black rock ‘n’ roll singer to pack places like the Stones.”
Tina would go on to pack stadiums — she thrilled 180,000 fans at Rio’s Maracanã Stadium in Brazil in 1988 while setting the record for the largest ticketed concert by a solo artist. But look at the whole quote, she made it clear, she was a rock ‘n’ roll singer.
“She’s one of the few women of color who declared that and was able to carry that through their career,,” Kameelah Benjamin-Fuller told the Herald. “It was a pioneering move for her to really claim that. The songs that she covered, the artists that she worked with, her approach to songs, even if they weren’t written as rock songs, they definitely had a rock infusion.”
Paying honor to the icon, Benjamin-Fuller is co-producing “Simply the Best: A Tribute to Tina Turner” on Saturday at the Burren in Davis Square. The night will be co-produced by Christina Alexander, a fellow singer and Benjamin-Fuller’s co-founder of G-Rock Music, which hosts gender-inclusive rock experiences powered by women of color. Through hits and obscurities across four decades, the concert will be fueled by a band of local aces (including Red Sox organist Josh Kantor!) and benefit Roxbury’s Stone House — an organization that cares for and protects adult and child survivors of domestic abuse.
As a woman of color who also loves rock, Benjamin-Fuller found Tina Turner to be a role model.
“She’s someone who’s respected, revered, pioneering, and who did amazing things in that space,” she said.
Benjamin-Fuller might sing a song or two, but she’s letting Alexander take lead on the majority of tunes while singer Ananda Mitchell will tackle four or five songs.
“One, we wanted to get folks who could handle the material, but, two, we also wanted to showcase women of color in that lead role,” Benjamin-Fuller said.
After finding the leads, the band fell into place fast. It seems everybody asked was eager to take on Tina’s epic catalog. And the evening will dig into that catalog.
“There are songs that people expect to hear, ‘Proud Mary,’ ‘River Deep, Mountain High,’ obviously ‘Simply the Best,’ ‘Private Dancer,’” Benjamin-Fuller said. “But then we talked about the songs that we loved… I’m leaving most of the vocals to Christina and Ananda, who are amazing. (We picked) some deep cuts. We found it liberating to stretch a little bit.”
Maybe “I Might Have Been Queen” or “Bold Soul Sister” or “Be Tender with Me Baby.” There are so many possibilities with Tina.
“Unfortunately, it’s tied to the passing of an artist we revere,” Benjamin-Fuller said. “But seeing how easy it was to mobilize around Tina was touching because we have seen all these tribute shows (put on by local artists) but we haven’t really had any that have highlighted women of color in this way.”
“We still have work to do but we have seen more and more women push through these barriers,” she continued. “Hopefully the next phase of this will see more intersections of sexual orientations, race, ethnicity, diversity in our rock scene.”
For tickets and details, visit burren.com. To support Stone House, visit stonehouseinc.org
