Bonnie Tyler, RIP

Bonnie Tyler, the Welsh singer best known for worldwide smash 1981 power ballad “Total Eclipse of the Heart,” died on Thursday at age 75. News came via a note from her family on her Facebook: “Bonnie’s family and team are heartbroken to announce that Bonnie unexpectedly passed away last night in hospital in Portugal as a result of the illness that she was being treated for.” Billboard reports that Tyler had been in the hospital for emergency intestinal surgery.

Born in 1951 as Gaynor Hopkins, she took to performing at an early age and used a couple different stage names before settling on Bonnie Tyler in 1975. It was a year later that she scored her first hit with her second single, “Lost in France,” that went to #9 in the UK. In 1977 she went worldwide with the twangy “It’s a Heartache,” that made great use of her husky voice and went Top 10 on the US Top 40 pop and country charts.

It would be another six years until she had another big hit, but it would be a whopper. Penned and produced by Meatloaf collaborator Jim Steinman, “Total Eclipse of the Heart” held the #1 spot on the Billboard Hot 100 for four weeks straight in 1983, ironically keeping Air Supply’s “Making Love Out of Nothing at All” — also written and produced by Steinman — at #2. Its equally iconic video, directed by Russell Mulcahy, was a constant in the early days of MTV. The song was nominated for two Grammys: female pop vocal performance and female rock performance.

Tyler would hit again in 1984 with another Steinman creation, “Holding Out For a Hero,” that was part of the smash Footloose soundtrack, but that would prove to be her last major hit. She did continue to have success in Europe through the 2000s, and represented the UK in the 2013 Eurovision Song Contest with “Believe in Me.” Tyler was bestowed the MBE in England in 2023 for her service to music.

Rest in peace, Bonnie.