Carnegie Hall

42 years ago today, Ike and Tina Turner played two explosive shows at Carnegie Hall. This installment of Live from Carnegie Hall remembers those concerts.

Artist: Ike and Tina Turner
Album: What You Hear is What You Get: Live at Carnegie Hall
Date Recorded: April 1, 1971
Label: United Artists
Fun Fact: Originally released as a double album in a tri-fold cover, What You Hear is What You Get: Live at Carnegie Hall reached No.25 in the Billboard 200, becoming Ike and Tina Turner's highest-charting US album.

Following the trend for rock and pop concerts at Carnegie Hall in the early 1970s, Ike and Tina Turner performed a doubleheader at the Hall on April Fool's Day, 1971. The 7:30 PM show was followed by an 11 o'clock concert that carried on into the early hours of April 2.

Although some Ike Turner-penned tunes appear on the album, cover versions of songs that include Otis Redding's "Respect" and "I've Been Loving You Too Long," Sly Stone's "I Want To Take You Higher" and "Everyday People," the Rolling Stones' "Honky Tonk Women," and Creedence Clearwater Revival's "Proud Mary" are probably the most memorable tunes on the recording.

Despite a very successful solo career, Tina Turner has performed at Carnegie Hall only once more to date—the 1993 staging of Sting's Rainforest Foundation benefit event. Ike Turner did not appear at Carnegie Hall again before his death in 2007.

Although not filmed at Carnegie Hall, this footage of Ike and Tina Turner performing "Proud Mary"—captured later the same year in Central Park, New York—provides a flavor of what audiences for the Carnegie Hall shows would have experienced.

Related:
Live from Carnegie Hall Series
Hall History