Ike Turner died last week at the age of 76, and the news of his death made me ponder the fact that every artist’s life and work can be represented as a Venn diagram – two circles intersecting, separate yet inseparable.

It also made me ponder the fact that how an artist is perceived by everyone else depends on whether everyone else is looking at one circle or at the other . . . or at the place where they intersect.

In the case of Mr. Turner, the public at large knew too much about his life with Tina Turner, and his abuse of her, to ever judge him solely on the basis of his contribution to modern music. After all, a large part of that contribution was in collaboration with Tina herself – and there, where his life and art intersected, is where he’ll be forever remembered.

Ike bitterly denied Tina’s claims of abuse . . . but we read the book, and we saw the movie. We can’t forget.

And yet.

There was “Rocket 88,” widely considered to be the first rock’n’roll record. The first.

There was the incendiary music with Tina.

There was the pounding funk of his piano and the dive-bombing screams of his Strat – sounds that no one had made before Ike.

And just this year, in 2007, there was a Grammy Award for Best Traditional Blues Album: Risin’ with the Blues.

One of that album’s standout tracks is called “Jesus Loves Me” – and while the title evokes an old children’s song, Ike’s version is a grown-up 12-bar autobiography. It’s the musical equivalent of the fierce eyes on the album cover, and it says, in part:

I’m a bad boy

But Jesus loves me anyway.

I’m a bad boy

But Jesus loves me anyway.

As long as Jesus loves me

I don’t care what nobody say.

And while I have no way of knowing, I suspect that may well have been Ike Turner’s final thought last Wednesday, December 12.

For both his strength and his weakness, his shame and his greatness . . . I hope we never forget him.

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That was last week.

This week, on December 18, Keith Richards turned 64.

Happy Birthday, Keef.  Thanks for the songs, the riffs, the bad behavior, and the heart.

And thanks for proving that a Telecaster has a thousand uses.

We wouldn’t be the same without you.