lit a candle 2 Sept 2026Bonnie once said something in an interview that changed how I thought about my own work. I've never forgotten it.
Their story
Gaynor Sullivan, born Gaynor Hopkins on 8 June 1951 and known to the world as Bonnie Tyler, was a Welsh singer whose husky, unmistakable voice became one of the most recognisable sounds in popular music. She died on 8 July 2026. Her rise began with her first studio album, The…
Gaynor Sullivan, born Gaynor Hopkins on 8 June 1951 and known to the world as Bonnie Tyler, was a Welsh singer whose husky, unmistakable voice became one of the most recognisable sounds in popular music. She died on 8 July 2026. Her rise began with her first studio album, The World Starts Tonight, released in 1977, and the singles drawn from it, "Lost in France" and "More Than a Lover". That same year brought "It's a Heartache", which climbed to number four in the UK singles chart and number three on the US Billboard Hot 100.
The 1980s took her in a harder, more dramatic direction, thanks to her partnership with the songwriter and producer Jim Steinman. It was Steinman who gave her the song that would define her career, "Total Eclipse of the Heart", a record that went on to sell more than 13 million copies around the world and led the album Faster Than the Speed of Night to the top of the UK chart in 1983. Steinman also wrote her other great hit of the decade, "Holding Out for a Hero". Among her further successes of those years were "Here She Comes", taken from the 1984 soundtrack to Metropolis, and "If You Were a Woman (And I Was a Man)", a Desmond Child composition that Steinman produced. In the 1990s she found a fresh audience across mainland Europe working with Dieter Bohlen, whose song "Bitterblue" she turned into a hit. In 2003 she returned to her most famous recording, taping a bilingual version with the singer Kareen Antonn under the title "Si demain... (Turn Around)", which reached number one in France.
Rocks and Honey followed in 2013, carrying the single "Believe in Me", the song she sang when she represented the United Kingdom at the Eurovision Song Contest in Malmö, Sweden, that year. A reunion with the producer David Mackay produced two more albums, Between the Earth and the Stars in 2019 and The Best Is Yet to Come in 2021.
Over the course of her career she received three Grammy Award nominations and three Brit Award nominations, twice in the category of British Female Solo Artist, along with other honours. In 2022 she was appointed MBE in the Queen's Birthday Honours for her services to music. Both "Total Eclipse of the Heart" and "It's a Heartache" are estimated to have sold more than 6 million copies apiece, placing them among the best-selling singles ever released.
Biography adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0), retold in our own words. Wikipedia ↗
Photos
5Bonnie Tyler in Moscow on the eve of a concert there.
by People Forever
Bonnie Tyler und Matt Petrin beim Konzert im Familiengarten Eberswalde, Bonnie Tyler hat der Veröffentlichung zugestimmt
by People Forever
Bonnie Tyler
by People Forever
Bonnie Tyler representing United Kingdom with the song Believe in Me during the first dress rehearsal for the Big Five in the Eurovision Song Contest 2013.
by People Forever
This made me cry. Thank you.