‘Beethoven in the Present Day’: Fans talk about what David Bowie meant to them 10 years after his death | David Bowie

For Debbie Hilton, David Bowie meant “everything.” “My house is a shrine to him. He is still alive in my house. My Christmas tree was David Bowie’s, and even my bed is Bowie’s,” she said.

She traveled from Liverpool to join fellow Bowie fans at the Starman Memorial in Brixton, south London, where the singer was born, to pay their respects on the anniversary of his death.

The gathering has become a site of annual pilgrimage for some, but this year larger crowds gathered than usual to mark the 10th anniversary of the artist’s death.

Hilton, 64, said she remembers the first time she met Bowie when she was a child in Manchester.

“It was at the Free Trade Hall in 1972. I was just a kid, and this was before he became famous with Ziggy. I just fell in love with him. I was 11 and I was in awe. It was like something you can’t imagine, the feeling of watching him. I’ve been hooked ever since,” she said.

Bowie’s death, which followed his diagnosis of liver cancer some 18 months earlier, shocked the world. It was announced days after the release of his 26th and final album, Blackstar, which has since been interpreted as an expression of the artist’s impending death.

When Bowie died, Hilton said her brother texted her in the morning saying, “Are you okay?” “I thought: What is he doing?” she said. Then I turned on the TV. Well, that was all. I couldn’t go to work for two weeks. I had lilies and a burning candle. I was crying and this continued for about a month. “It was like losing everything in my life.”

Julian Furnivall braved the cold weather to place flowers on the mural. “No matter what the weather says, we will always come here and pay our respects,” said the 68-year-old, looking emotional as he pasted stickers on the glass protecting the memorial.

Furnivall said he has been a Bowie fan since he got a copy of Aladdin Sane for Christmas when he was 13 years old. He still remembers the day Starman’s death was announced. “It’s still very bad,” he said. “Our niece phoned us at 6.30am and said it had happened. We couldn’t believe it but then we turned on the TV. It was really upsetting. It was a huge shock.”

His partner, Laura Hogg, 69, wrote the names of fans from around the world on the memorial on their behalf. The couple has yet to listen to Blackstar. “We never had the courage to play it all because my son says it’s a very solemn album,” Furnivall said. “Knowing that he was in a lot of pain and still doing it is amazing,” Hough agrees.

Sisters Jenny Wasiak, 65, a train conductor who traveled to Brixton from Norwich, and Astrid Ballhorn, 74, who is retired, came to “spend the day doing all the things for Bowie to do what we can to remember him and love him.”

“We don’t like a lot of each other’s music, but as for David, he’s our favorite,” Ballhorn said. “We worship and love David and miss him terribly,” Wasiak said. “We came here the year he died.”

Reflecting on his legacy, Wasiak called Black Star an “amazing” and “touching” parting gift. “He gave something to everyone, explaining that he was dying,” she said. “It was very touching and a wonderful piece of music as well.”

“He is an iconic legend who has influenced everyone,” Ballhorn said.

“If you listen to musicians talking, almost all of them reference David in one way or another.”

“I was listening to an interview the other day that compared him to Beethoven,” she said. “He is the Beethoven of today. It is a type of music that will live for 200 years or more.” “It seems unbelievable to think that we lost him 10 years ago.

“He was a genius, and there will never be anyone else like him.”