Her iconic voice, forever raspy and full of passion, has now been silenced: singer Bonnie Tyler died Wednesday at the age of 75 following a long illness.
Tyler's family and team posted the news on Tyler’s official website on Thursday, stating they were “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.”
The star had been hospitalized there since May and was placed in an induced coma following emergency intestinal surgery. Last month, her spokesperson revealed that Tyler was out of the coma but remained “very unwell” in intensive care. She is survived by her husband of 53 years, Robert Sullivan.
That raspy voice of Tyler's was the result of nodules she developed on her vocal cords in the 1970s, singing six nights a week in clubs. She underwent throat surgery in 1976, and after four months of recovery, her voice was stronger, but it also had her now-signature rasp, according to People. However, Reuters reported she was ordered to rest her voice following the operation, but one day in 1977 she screamed in anger, permanently altering it.
In April 2024, the last time much of the U.S. experienced a total solar eclipse, Tyler was asked about "Total Eclipse of the Heart," the powerful rock ballad that proved to be her biggest hit song and has attracted more than six million likes on YouTube. “Every time the eclipse comes, everyone all over the world, they play Total Eclipse of the Heart, and I never get tired of singing it,” she told Good Morning America.
In 1983, that song shot up the charts like a rocket and stayed the number one song in the U.S. for four consecutive weeks. In 2017, Tyler performed a duet of the song with Eurovision Song Contest winner Johnny Logan on a New Year's Eve broadcast in Austria.
And for a generation of gay men, like Advocate Senior Editor John Casey, that and Tyler's "Holding Out for A Hero," provided both a soundtrack for their coming of age and a gym workout playlist in 2026.
"Holding Out for a Hero" debuted in 1984 with the film Footloose. It reached No. 34 in the United States and No. 2 in the United Kingdom. “I like singing them," Tyler told The Guardian in 2013 of her two biggest ‘80s hits. "They’re what gets the crowd going.”
The crowd at the 2001 Miss Gay Black America pageant certainly roared when the late Tandi Iman Dupree performed “Holding Out for a Hero” in a video that's since gone viral. Some say it was “the greatest drag queen entrance of all time,” and here's why:
The Memphis, Tennessee, native appeared on stage alongside her dancing partner, Dee St. James. According to Canada's IN Magazine, just as the song intro reached its crescendo, Tandi unexpectedly dropped from the ceiling to the stage floor in a Wonder Woman costume and landed in a split, timed to Bonnie Tyler’s first syllable. Tandi's drag mother, Tamisha Iman, discussed the iconic moment while competing on season 13 of RuPaul's Drag Race.
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Tyler’s first successful single was actually “It’s a Heartache,” which debuted in 1977 on her second album for RCA Records, Natural Force. That song climbed as high as No. 3 in the U.S. and No. 4 in the U.K., and topped the charts in both Australia and Canada.
But as People reported, even though it's the song that made her a star, Tyler was not a fan. “I was a bit cheesed off,” she told the magazine, because of her management team, her contract, and her songwriters. “I didn’t even like it as I was recording it,” she said. Instead of working with them, Tyler waited out the end of her contract and, in 1983, found a new manager and label.
That's when Tyler released “Total Eclipse of the Heart,” which was written by the late Jim Steinman, whom she credited for their enduring popularity. Steinman also wrote power-ballad hits for Meatloaf, Air Supply, and Celine Dion.
“I poured my heart out singing it,” Tyler told The Guardian in 2023. She shared the story of an old letter she’d written about the song. "It says: ‘I recorded an incredible song today. The trouble is, it’s so long, I don’t think anybody will ever play it.’ ‘Total Eclipse of the Heart’ had to be shortened from seven to four minutes, but everybody loved it so much they played the full album version anyway.”
Tyler was born in 1951 in Skewen, Wales, and was named Gaynor Hopkins; Bonnie Tyler was her stage name. She was one of seven children, and told The Guardian in 2012 how much her mother meant to her.
“My mum was a wonderful mother,” she said. “I remember she said to me: ‘Believe in yourself because no one else is going to do it for you.’ I’m sure a lot of my success is due to her words of advice.”
She got her start in the music business at age 17, answering a club's newspaper ad for backup singers. “In those days, it was easier for people to come in the music business because there were a lot more clubs and dance halls,” she told The Guardian in 2013. “It wasn’t so much DJs around then; it was live bands. So, I was singing in clubs for seven years. I was doing everybody else’s hits then. We had different nights — one night we’d do blues, one night we’d do pop or country, and on a Sunday, people used to do ballroom dancing.”
In 1973, she married the club’s manager, Sullivan, and she said their marriage was a success and lasted so long because they wed before she became famous.
