Simply the best: Columbia musicians to honor Tina Turner on anniversary of her death

Some artists loom as large as trees, stretching over and cooling the landscape.

Others live like perpetual seeds, cracking open, creating new growth.

For Phylshawn Johnson, Tina Turner remains both a tree and a seed. The late rock 'n' roll icon shaded her path to becoming a singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, indie record label founder and music educator. And Turner's vast discography nourishes Johnson's sense of discovery, even now, decades after falling in love with the music.

This outsize influence and intimate connection spurred Johnson to pay Turner due honor, gathering a who's-who of Columbia musicians for a months-long investment of time, talent and soul. Their work will pay dividends at The Blue Note later this month, culminating in a Turner tribute show on the one-year anniversary of her death.

And love has everything to do with it.

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A Love Like Yours (Don’t Come Knocking Everyday): Discovering Tina

Growing up in Missouri, Turner's music was ambient, almost like weather to Johnson: always in the atmosphere, rarely a conscious choice. That all changed after the release of "What's Love Got to Do with It?" the 1993 biopic starring Oscar nominees Angela Bassett and Laurence Fishburne as Tina and Ike Turner.

Johnson's fellow churchgoers made references to the film, even rehearsed lines of dialogue, but she didn't understand the inside jokes. Then the film arrived on VHS, part of a tape club to which her mother subscribed.

Popping the tape in for a movie night, Johnson recalls "being so inspired by this woman who, turns out, is my height, almost the same skin tone, someone who decided at some point that all music was her music."

That last phrase is key. Johnson's church environs heard the devil in the details of secular music, actively discouraging listening to anything but gospel. Tina Turner delivered a songbook of revelation.

"It was a freedom, in a way, to get to know her music," Johnson said.

And that freedom took on an ever-changing form. After watching and re-watching "What's Love Got to Do with It?" Johnson's mother sprung for the movie's soundtrack. Wearing out the cassette, she acquired the set on CD.

Then Johnson went from the movie to the more unvarnished story, as captured in Turner's 1986 autobiography "I, Tina"; and from studio albums to more "raw" live records from early in the artist's career.

Describing the bond she felt with this music, Johnson sounded like someone describing how lightning strikes. She initially talked about the power in Turner's voice, but quickly moved from the physical to the metaphysical.

"When we have a favorite artist, their sound pierces us — it connects to our soul, and it attaches to the events in our lives," she said.

It’s Gonna Work Out Fine: The making of a tribute show

Tina Turner died on May 24, 2023 at age 83. In online fan groups, Johnson noted a near-immediate piecing together of tribute concerts. Violet Vonder Haar, Johnson's spouse and longtime collaborator, nudged her to do likewise but she felt unsure. Gauging interest with an initial Facebook post, she received waves of affirmation.

Johnson began reaching out to friends in hopes of creating something both thorough and tender. She firmly believes whoever is meant to be involved with a given project will be, and the band Johnson gathered will stagger anyone who's spent more than a few minutes in the Columbia music scene.

Johnson is one of six remarkable vocalists who will take the lead at various points; she joins Aina Cook, Augusta Cooper, Rochara Knight, Symonne Sparks and Alli O'Neil.

The band and backing vocalists behind them include members of local projects Johnson has staffed — Violet and the Undercurrents, Stingrays, The Doxies — as well as past and present Columbia bands such as Mercury Trio, Bockman, Interstellar Overdrive and The Fried Crawdaddies.

Listeners will experience double the guitar action, double the keyboards and a four-piece horn section.

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"If you’re gonna do it, you gotta do it right," Johnson said, laughing at the scope of the matter.

Rehearsals began back in October, with Johnson choosing 20 potential songs for each of two sets: the first will focus on Turner's music from the 1960s and '70s, the second inhabits music of the '80s and '90s. After the band learned all 40 cuts, subsequent rehearsals were devoted to fine-tuning and focusing the set, Johnson said.

Signature songs will be present, but of course Johnson hears so much more in the Turner catalog. She hears all the rich bar blues and spirituals as well as wonderful turns like a 1982 cover of the Temptations' "Ball of Confusion," which exhibits a very early, very refined use of synthesizers in pop.

Turner's sound and style somehow always lined up exactly with innovations in music technology, Johnson added.

Ultimately, Johnson wanted the material of the tribute show to be "uplifting," "accessible" and to articulate the true tall tale of Turner's career. She and her fellow singers are far from Turner impersonators, she said, and have focused on telling and selling each story in song.

"If you can convey the story, you’ll be there," Johnson said.

That alignment of singer and story promises to yield resonant moments. To hear Symonne Sparks, for example, interpret Turner's "Black Coffee" will bring the experience of Black women past- and present-tense into greater relief, Johnson said, the song using the beverage itself as a metaphor for presence and personal power.

Something Beautiful Remains: What to do with Tina Turner's music from here

Johnson talks about these songs, the songs which rewrote her internal musical map, as if she's discovering them all over again. And so much of Turner's work, she said, remains to be discovered by the casual fan.

Just one of the songs which falls into the "Did you know?" category: Turner's reading of the Albert Hammond-Diane Warren ballad "Don't Turn Around," released as a B-side to her single "Typical Male" in 1986; Ace of Base's version of the song became a global hit just seven years later.

Listeners who attend the Turner tribute, then want to follow a parallel path have plenty of options, Johnson said. For those wanting to burrow into the music, she recommends four records.

"Workin' Together," released by Ike and Tina Turner in 1970, contains the legendary "Proud Mary," but also the opening title track, a "call for waking up and accepting and loving your neighbors," Johnson said.

1984's multiplatinum "Private Dancer" is stocked with great songs, she said. And Johnson commends Turner's final two studio albums, the late "bookends" of 1996's "Wildest Dreams" and 1999's "Twenty Four Seven." The former has a tomorrow-is-today sound to it and "really, really deep" production, she said; the latter seems to tie together every sound Turner ever furthered.

"From there, you can just dive into wherever you want to go," Johnson said.

Queen of Rock N Roll: A Tribute to Tina Turner takes place 8 p.m. Friday May 24 at The Blue Note; tickets are $10. Learn more at https://thebluenote.com/.

Aarik Danielsen is the features and culture editor for the Tribune. Contact him at adanielsen@columbiatribune.com or by calling 573-815-1731. He's on Twitter/X @aarikdanielsen.

This article originally appeared on Columbia Daily Tribune: How one Columbia musician's devotion inspired Tina Turner tribute show