Bonnie Tyler's cracked voice is eclipsed at 75 years old

BarcelonaThe powerful voice of Bonnie Tyler, who poured her heart out in Total eclipse of the heart, and the cracked voice that surrendered to heartbreak in It's a heartache, has finally fallen silent. As confirmed by the BBC, the Welsh singer has died at the age of 75 in Portugal, in Faro, where she had settled to live during the seasons she was not performing. Her discography leaves behind a handful of immortal hits, a vocal surgery, an unexpected revival, and a steadfast dedication that has kept her on stage for practically half a century uninterrupted. "I'm never going to retire. What do you want me to do? Stop and die? I love performing too much," she stated in a television interview in the summer of 2024. Tyler continued to tour, filling halls mainly in Germany, France, and Central European countries, much more so than in her native United Kingdom.

Born in 1951 in a small village in the county of Neath (United Kingdom), natural talent accompanied a young Gaynor Hopkins, Tyler's real name, who came second in a local talent contest. That result pushed her to pursue a career that seemed unthinkable for a girl who left school at 16 to work in a grocery store and perform some nights, first alongside Bobby Wayne and The Dixies, and then as a solo artist. Talent scout Roger Bell discovered her performing at the Townsman Club in Swansea and invited her to London to record a demo. RCA Records offered her a recording contract and proposed she change her name. Her first single, My! My! Honeycomb (1976) went unnoticed, but the second, Lost in France (1977), already climbed into the British top 10. The album The world starts tonight (1977) launched her on her first tour but also into a delicate moment.

In 1977, nodules were detected in her vocal cords and she underwent emergency surgery. Rest was essential for recovery, but her desire to continue her career led her to disobey medical orders. Legend has it that she screamed in desperation and permanently damaged her cords. Be that as it may, her register changed. But what could have been the end of a professional career became her identity and defining brand: a cracked, rough, and powerful voice. "My producers said: My God, you have a hoarse voice now..., but we love it," she had explained. "My voice is not a mistake, it is my instrument," she defended. With this new voice, she recorded her second major hit, "It’s a heartache, that with the album Natural Force (1978) reached the charts in the United Kingdom and the United States. Bonnie Tyler became a name that Anglo-Saxon pop-rock could no longer ignore.

The golden age of Tyler

Having exhausted country pop, Tyler allied himself with the grandiloquence of composer and producer Jim Steiman, who wrote for her the apocalyptic power balladTotal eclipse of the heart (1983), a number 1 across Europe, the United States, and Australia with sales exceeding nine million copies. The album Faster than the speed of night earned her two Grammy nominations and consecration. The 1980s were her golden era, with globally resonant hits like Holding out for a hero, If you were a woman (and I was a man), and Here she comes.When the Anglophone world wanted to sideline her, Tyler settled in Germany. The 90s and 2000s were decades of success in continental Europe, starting with the soft rock and synthesizers of Bitterblue. And although she didn't reach past sales again, she didn't slow down, with new collaborations, new albums – she has released eighteen–, compilations and concerts. In 2013, the United Kingdom asked her to be their representative at Eurovision with Believe in me. In 2021, she still released a new album with a significant title The best is yet to come. And all this despite her great hits continuing to work on their own: David Guetta re-released Together with electronics in 2025 and Total eclipse of the heart reached a billion streams on Spotify this 2026.