She sat in a doctor's rooms and heard the word "cancer". And in that moment, Lisa Koppel's very first thought was not about herself. It was about her three little ones at home.
Right there, she made up her mind. Her children would not be told. Not then, not later, not ever if she could help it. She wanted them to keep their happiness and their innocence for as long as possible, and she was not going to let a disease steal whatever time she had left with them.
That is why the wife of award-winning pop star Danny K kept her colon cancer diagnosis a secret for three long years. Only her husband and a tiny circle of family knew what she was going through. So when it was announced earlier this month that Lisa (41), a former model and legal advocate, had died, the news knocked the country sideways.
In an emotional post on his official Instagram page, a grieving Danny (48) said his family are "shattered".
"I have lost the wife I worshipped, our three children have lost an extraordinary mother, and her family and friends have lost someone they deeply loved," he wrote.
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A Funeral Full Of People Who Never Knew
Many of the mourners who gathered at Joburg's Westpark Cemetery — the same resting place as political activist Ahmed Kathrada, kwaito star Mandoza and singer Johnny Clegg — were still trying to make sense of it all.
Right up until the end, people in her social circle had no idea what Lisa had been carrying. And now there they stood, watching her cream-coloured coffin, draped in a black cloth embossed with a gold Star of David, being lowered into the ground.
Danny could not bring himself to speak. Rabbi Michael Katz read out the tribute the singer had written for his wife instead.
"Lisa lived with extraordinary grace," he wrote. "For three years she carried an enormous burden quietly. She never wanted her illness to define her. She wanted no pity, attention or sympathy. She simply wanted to be Lisa. A wife, a mother, a daughter, a sister and a friend."
The illness was already taking so much from her. So she took charge of the one thing she still could — who knew.
"Above all, she wanted to protect our children and preserve their happiness and innocence for as long as possible," Danny explained in his social media post.
'I Will Face This Alone With My Husband Next To Me'
Sons Jayden (12) and Kyle (9) and three-year-old daughter Chloe were Lisa's whole world, says Danny's father, Gavin Koppel (74), speaking from Danny's home in Sandton, Joburg.
The Koppel and Gundelfinger families — Lisa was the daughter of well-known celebrity divorce lawyer Billy Gundelfinger — have gathered there for shiva, the Jewish seven-day period of mourning.
From her diagnosis in November 2023 right through to the very end, Lisa kept her illness hidden from her children.
"Only myself, Danny, my wife Pam and Lisa's parents Billy and Michelle knew she was sick – and, of course, Lisa's siblings, Danny's sister and the doctors," Gavin says. "She said, 'I don't want my children to go through it. I will face this alone with my husband next to me,'" Gavin says.
Her children were not with her when she died at a private hospital. Only her parents, Danny and his mother, Pam (73), were at her side. The children were not at the funeral either.
Gavin, a successful businessman who hosts a show on Joburg radio station 919 FM, says the family's focus now is entirely on the children and helping them make sense of what has happened.
"They had no idea their mother was sick so of course it's a monumental shock."
Remarkably, Gavin says, Lisa never looked ill — not even while she was having chemotherapy.
"She retained her physical beauty throughout her condition. It was remarkable."
He says the couple searched the world over for something, anything, that could save her. "They did everything in their power; they even saw top doctors in America. But they eventually ran out of roads."
The Love Story That Charmed A Nation
Their romance captured South Africa from the very beginning. Danny was the chart-topping star who gave us Hurts So Bad and Brown Eyes in the early noughties. Lisa was the glamorous model who swapped the camera for the courtroom.
The two families had known each other for years, but Danny and Lisa only crossed paths in 2009, when they became pen pals of a sort. Danny was working in London and Los Angeles on his fifth album, Across The Line, when the texting started.
"I fell in love with her personality and intellect before anything else," he said.
They texted for three months before he came home. By then he was ready to meet the blonde beauty, who had just been admitted as an advocate of the High Court after finishing her law degree. They met for coffee in Joburg and talked for hours.
In 2011 Danny proposed at Londolozi Game Reserve near the Kruger National Park. Lisa later found out he had been planning the whole thing right under her nose for three months.
A year later they married in a lavish ceremony at the Lourensford wine estate in Somerset West, just outside Cape Town.
"Our family has a holiday house in Cape Town and it's like a second home to me," she said. "I just had to get married there."
On a glorious autumn day in April 2012, the couple said their vows in front of 350 guests. Lisa stunned in a figure-hugging fishtail dress by Spanish luxury bridal label Pronovias. She had nine bridesmaids. Danny had 18 groomsmen.
Kwaito singer Kabelo was his best man, and the guest list read like a roll call of local entertainment — Loyiso, Chad Saaiman and Kurt Darren among them.
The only thing missing, Danny said, was his younger brother Jarren Koppel (23), who should have been standing beside him as best man. Jarren, his closest friend and road manager, died along with five others in a helicopter crash in the Panorama Gorge near Graskop in Mpumalanga in 2003.
"We were very close. It was difficult not to have him there [at the wedding]. But I could still feel his presence," said Danny, who dedicated his second album, J23, to his brother.
In the week before the wedding, the couple followed the Jewish tradition of not seeing or speaking to each other. "We just sent each other gifts every day," she said.
At the reception, Danny serenaded his bride with Etta James' At Last — a song that meant everything to a man who once believed marriage was not in the cards for him.
"At one stage I thought I'd never get married, let alone have a happy marriage," he said in 2022, when the couple celebrated their 10th anniversary.
"My wife is an amazing woman – one of the biggest gifts I was given was a happy marriage," Danny said.
A Private Life, Built Carefully
The couple worked hard to keep their lives out of the spotlight, especially their children.
In 2017, three years after their first baby arrived, Lisa walked away from a lucrative legal career to start her own online shoe business, Running Bear Moccasins. The long hours and stress of court and chambers simply did not fit her life any more.
"It wasn't conducive to being a mother."
The business idea came from her son's rather large feet. "We couldn't find shoes that would fit him," she explained. So she designed a pair herself and had a sample made in China, where Danny had contacts. The business took off, and two more children followed.
In 2022 Danny made his own career switch, buying the iconic sweet brand Sweets from Heaven after it hit financial trouble. But music never left him.
In December last year he marked 25 years in the industry with an album called Kollection, featuring 18 remastered tracks and two unreleased songs with Mandoza.
"Making this record brought back so many memories and felt so therapeutic," Danny said at the time. "I want to share this moment with my fans. They've been with me from the start."
Hardly anyone knew that behind the celebration, he was standing beside the woman he adored as she fought for her life.
Colon Cancer: What You Need To Know
Colorectal or colon cancer is one of the top three cancers affecting both women and men in South Africa.
According to the Cancer Association of South Africa, evidence points to more and more younger people being diagnosed with it in recent years.
It used to be a disease mostly affecting people in their sixties and seventies, but it is now showing up with alarming frequency in patients decades younger, says Dr Ilze Fourie, a radiation oncologist at Mediclinic Louis Leipoldt in Cape Town.
"Yet only 10 to15% of cases are linked to inherited syndromes such as familial adenomatous polyposis or Lynch syndrome," she says. "That means the vast majority of young patients have no family history at all — and no reason to suspect anything is wrong."
That is exactly what makes it so dangerous. Colon cancer is quiet. It grows slowly, often for years, before it makes itself known.
Warning signs to watch for:
- Blood in your stool, or very dark stools
- A change in bowel habits that lasts longer than a few weeks — constipation, diarrhoea, or stools that suddenly become thin
- Cramping, bloating or stomach pain that will not go away
- Feeling like your bowel does not empty completely
- Losing weight without trying
- Constant tiredness or weakness, which can be a sign of anaemia caused by slow bleeding
The problem, Dr Fourie says, is that young people — and sometimes their doctors — brush these symptoms off. They get blamed on stress, haemorrhoids, a bad diet or irritable bowel syndrome.
"When a 35-year-old walks in with rectal bleeding, cancer is often the last thing anyone considers. By the time the diagnosis is made, the disease has frequently advanced."
When should you get screened?
Guidelines now recommend that people at average risk start screening at 45 — not 50, as was previously advised. If you have a family history of colorectal cancer or polyps, inflammatory bowel disease, or a known genetic syndrome, you should start much earlier and speak to your doctor about when.
A colonoscopy remains the gold standard. It can spot polyps and remove them before they ever turn into cancer. There are also stool-based tests that are less invasive and can be done more regularly.
"This is one of the most preventable cancers we know of," Dr Fourie says. "Caught early, the survival rates are excellent. That is the tragedy of it — people die of a disease we could have stopped."
Lower your risk:
- Eat more fibre — vegetables, fruit and whole grains
- Cut back on red and processed meat
- Move your body most days of the week
- Keep your weight in a healthy range
- Limit alcohol and stop smoking
Turning Grief Into Something That Saves Lives
The Koppel and Gundelfinger families have decided that Lisa's death will not be the end of her story.
They are asking South Africans to do the one thing that might have changed everything — get checked. Book the appointment. Ask the awkward question. Do not wait until something feels seriously wrong, because by then it often is.
"If sharing what happened to Lisa convinces even one person to get screened, then something good will have come from this," a family friend says.
Danny has asked for privacy while his family grieves, particularly for his three children as they begin to understand a loss they never saw coming.
For three years, Lisa Koppel carried something enormous so that her babies would not have to. That was who she was, right to the very last day.
If you notice any of the symptoms listed above, speak to your doctor. Early detection saves lives.
