Floyd Eugene Robinson (August 10, 1932 – May 28, 2016) was an American singer, born in

Nashville, Tennessee Nashville is the capital city of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the county seat, seat of Davidson County, Tennessee, Davidson County. With a population of 689,447 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 U.S. census, Nashville is the List of muni ...

, who was briefly successful in the late 1950s.

Career

Music

Robinson's music was similar stylistically to that of

John D. Loudermilk John Dee Loudermilk Jr. (March 31, 1934 – September 21, 2016) was an American singer and songwriter. Although he had his own recording career during the 1950s and 1960s, he was primarily known as a songwriter. His best-known songs include "I ...

, and Robinson, like Loudermilk, worked as a

songwriter A songwriter is a musician who professionally composes musical compositions or writes lyrics for songs, or both. The writer of the music for a song can be called a composer, although this term tends to be used mainly in the classical music gen ...

. Among his songwriting contributions was "The Little Space Girl", a hit for his cousin, Jesse Lee Turner. Robinson recorded for King Records (1954),

RCA Victor RCA Records is an American record label currently owned by Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America. It is one of Sony Music's four flagship labels, alongside RCA's former long-time rival Columbia Records; also Aris ...

, Dot,

Jamie Jamie is a unisex name. It is a diminutive form of James or, more rarely, other names. It is also given as a name in its own right. People Female * Jamie Anne Allman (born 1977), American actress * Jamie Babbit (born 1970), American film and te ...

, and

Groove Groove or Grooves may refer to: Music * Groove (music) * Groove (drumming) * The Groove (band), an Australian rock/pop band of the 1960s * The Groove (Sirius XM), a US radio station * Groove 101.7FM, a former Perth, Australia, radio station * ...

over the course of his career, and released a full-length

album An album is a collection of audio recordings issued on compact disc (CD), Phonograph record, vinyl, audio tape, or another medium such as Digital distribution#Music, digital distribution. Albums of recorded sound were developed in the early ...

on RCA. He scored one hit single in the US, " Makin' Love", which reached No. 27 on the ''

Billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertise ...

Black Singles The Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart ranks the most popular R&B and hip hop songs in the United States and is published weekly by '' Billboard''. Rankings are based on a measure of radio airplay, sales data, and streaming activity. The chart had 100 ...

chart A chart (sometimes known as a graph) is a graphical representation for data visualization, in which "the data is represented by symbols, such as bars in a bar chart, lines in a line chart, or slices in a pie chart". A chart can represent tabu ...

, and No. 20 on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 in 1959. The track reached No. 9 in the

UK Singles Chart The UK Singles Chart (currently titled Official Singles Chart, with the upper section more commonly known as the Official UK Top 40) is compiled by the Official Charts Company (OCC), on behalf of the British record industry, listing the top-s ...

the same year. In the US, "Makin' Love" was controversial because of its suggestive sexual content and many radio stations pulled it from the airwaves after only a few weeks. Golden Sandy Records released a

compilation album A compilation album comprises Album#Tracks, tracks, which may be previously released or unreleased, usually from several separate recordings by either one or several Performing arts#Performers, performers. If by one artist, then generally the tr ...

of Robinson's recorded output, including his entire 1959 full-length, on CD in 1994.

Other

From approximately 1973 to 1977, Robinson recorded and released religious-themed children's albums, as characters Charlie the Hamster, Ricky the Cricket, and Woody Woodchuck. In the 1990s Robinson self-published two books, the instruction manual ''Guitar Playing Made Easy'' (1992), and the novel ''The Guitar'' (1994). He owned a used car dealership, but remained active in the

music industry The music industry consists of the individuals and organizations that earn money by writing songs and musical compositions, creating and selling recorded music and sheet music, presenting concerts, as well as the organizations that aid, train, ...

. Robinson died on May 28, 2016, in

Hendersonville, Tennessee Hendersonville is the largest city in Sumner County, Tennessee, on Old Hickory Lake. The population was 61,753 at the 2020 census. Hendersonville is the fourth-largest city in the Nashville metropolitan area after Nashville, Murfreesboro, an ...

, after a long illness, at age 83.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Robinson, Floyd 1932 births 2016 deaths American country singer-songwriters King Records artists Country musicians from Tennessee American male singer-songwriters Singer-songwriters from Tennessee