Bonnie Tyler, singer of Total Eclipse of the Heart, dies aged 75 | BBC News — Transcript

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1. 0:00One of the stories there in our
2. 0:01headlines, the death of the British
3. 0:02singer Bonnie Tyler, who has died at the
4. 0:04age of 75. We've just had a tribute paid
5. 0:08by the Secretary of State for Wales. Uh,
6. 0:12so sad to hear of the death of Bonnie
7. 0:15Tyler, says the statement, uh, Grammy
8. 0:18and Brit Award winner, uh, and the sound
9. 0:21of my teenage years. Indeed, so I think
10. 0:24a lot of people will be, uh, thinking on
11. 0:25the similar lines today. She was best
12. 0:27known, of course, for that powerhouse
13. 0:28ballad, Totally Eclipse of the Heart,
14. 0:30which passed a billion streams on
15. 0:32Spotify earlier this year. She had, as I
16. 0:35said in the headlines, been unwell since
17. 0:37May. She'd had emergency surgery in
18. 0:40Portugal. Uh, with me is our
19. 0:41entertainment correspondent, Lisa Mima.
20. 0:43What did you you know about the
21. 0:46condition she was in following the
22. 0:47surgery?
23. 0:48>> Well, they didn't give a huge amount of
24. 0:49detail, just regular updates on how she
25. 0:52was doing, and the direction seemed to
26. 0:54be that she was getting better. So
27. 0:56people will be very shocked by today's
28. 0:58news because she was a muchloved singer.
29. 1:01Those songs were absolutely huge and she
30. 1:03was one of those people when you heard
31. 1:05that voice you knew exactly who it was.
32. 1:08And you know, we were talking about
33. 1:10earlier before we came on air about, you
34. 1:11know, those raspy vocals. You know, that
35. 1:13grally voice that was actually the
36. 1:15result of uh in the 1970s she had an
37. 1:18operation on her throat for for nodules
38. 1:20and one day afterwards she kind of
39. 1:22screamed in frustration and that kind of
40. 1:25produced this permanent incredible
41. 1:27voice. Now, it would have been easy to
42. 1:30think with a voice like that all you did
43. 1:32was kind of belt out these kind of like
44. 1:34power songs and action-packed, you know,
45. 1:36hits. But actually what she had the
46. 1:39power to do was bring a huge range of
47. 1:41emotion into that. I mean total eclipse
48. 1:43of the heart. I mean what a song. And
49. 1:45you know the songs ranged from you know
50. 1:47just kind of real action images to real
51. 1:50genuine you know heartbreaking emotion.
52. 1:54She could do all that within the range
53. 1:55of her voice. It was her absolute life.
54. 1:57And you know she adapted to different
55. 2:00ways that people were enjoying music.
56. 2:01She was talking about Tik Tok doing
57. 2:03karaoke there. You know, absolutely. It
58. 2:05was at the heart of her life, the heart
59. 2:07of her existence. You know, for her,
60. 2:09singing was absolutely everything. And
61. 2:11the interaction she had with fans, both
62. 2:13young and old. And she was one of those
63. 2:15people who with those huge songs, even
64. 2:17people that weren't even born when those
65. 2:19songs were hits in the UK or the United
66. 2:22States, still knew her music because the
67. 2:24songs had a wonderful longevity to them.
68. 2:26They didn't feel of the time. And you
69. 2:29know, people are still listening to
70. 2:30those songs today. I mean, look at the
71. 2:32number of, you know, streams you were
72. 2:33saying that they have on things like
73. 2:35Spotify and on streaming services. They
74. 2:37have a timeless quality. Part of that
75. 2:39was the songs themselves, but a huge
76. 2:41part of that timeless quality was
77. 2:43Bonnie's singing, the vocal power she
78. 2:46brought to it. A range of just emotion
79. 2:48to power to sincerity to everything. And
80. 2:51it just it gets you just there.
81. 2:53>> Yeah. Well said. Yeah. She'll be sadly
82. 2:55missed. Bonnie Tyler who has died at the
83. 2:57age of 75. Le, thank you very much.