Vicki Sue Robinson

Vicki Sue Robinson (May 31, 1954 – April 27, 2000) was an American singer and Broadway performer born in Harlem, New York. Her father, Bill Robinson, was an African American Shakespearean actor, and her mother, Marianne Robinson, was a European American folk singer who performed alongside Pete Seeger. Robinson spent her early childhood in Philadelphia before returning to New York City with her family around age ten.

Her performing life began unusually early. At six years old, in 1960, she joined her mother onstage at the Philadelphia Folk Festival, marking her first public appearance. As a teenager attending the New Lincoln School in Manhattan, she made her professional debut on Broadway in the cast of Hair, a production she remained with for six weeks. She then transitioned to another Broadway musical, Soon, whose ensemble included Peter Allen, Barry Bostwick, Nell Carter, and Richard Gere. Following Soon's brief run, Robinson appeared in the Off-Broadway production Long Time Coming, Long Time Gone, in which she and Gere portrayed Mimi and Richard Fariña. She also took small roles in the films Going Home (1971) and To Find a Man (1972). After a period in Japan, where she collaborated with Itsuro Shimoda on his album Love Songs and Lamentations and toured nationally with him, Robinson returned to Broadway in 1973 to join the cast of Jesus Christ Superstar.

Her recording career began in 1972, when she was among a group of Hair veterans invited to contribute background vocals to Todd Rundgren's album Something/Anything. Her path toward a solo career opened in 1975, when producer and RCA Records engineer Warren Schatz heard her singing at a New York session for Scott Fagan's album Many Sunny Places. Impressed by her voice, Schatz brought her in to record demos, one of which — a cover of the Foundations' "Baby Now That I've Found You" — became her first solo release. Though that single did not chart, RCA moved forward with a full debut album, Never Gonna Let You Go, produced by Schatz. The title track reached the top ten on the disco charts, but a second cut from the album, "Turn the Beat Around," generated growing attention and was released as a single, topping the disco charts on March 20, 1976. The song climbed into the U.S. top ten by August of that year, spending roughly six months on the Billboard Hot 100 and lifting the album to number 49. Internationally, it reached number 14 in Canada, number 11 in the Netherlands, and number 12 in South Africa. The track earned Robinson a Grammy nomination for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance.

Throughout 1976, Robinson promoted the single with extensive touring across the United States, performing on television programs including The Midnight Special, Don Kirshner's Rock Concert, The Merv Griffin Show, American Bandstand, and Soul Train, as well as at venues such as Carnegie Hall and the Bottom Line in New York. Her touring band included Dan Pickering on trumpet and flute, Bill Cerulli on drums, Wendy Simmons on bass guitar, Nacho Mena on percussion, Vernie "Butch" Taylor on guitar, and George Pavlis on keyboards, with Pavlis later replaced by Joey Melotti. Several of these musicians recorded tracks on her self-titled second album, Vicki Sue Robinson, released in the fall of 1976, which peaked at number 45. A cover of Bobby Womack's "Daylight" served as the lead single, reaching number 61 on the Hot 100. Her next chart entry came in August 1977 with a version of David Gates' "Hold Tight," which peaked at number 67 and reached number 2 on the disco chart. Its parent album, Half and Half, again produced by Schatz, was released in 1978 and peaked at number 110.

In 1979, Robinson contributed the track "Easy to Be Hard" to Disco Spectacular, a Schatz-produced album of dance arrangements of songs from Hair. That same year she recorded her fourth and final RCA album, Movin' On, with T. Life serving as the working producer despite Schatz receiving executive producer credit. She also recorded "Nighttime Fantasy" for the film Nocturna: Granddaughter of Dracula, which became a club hit in 1979. Also connected to that film's production company was the movie Gangsters, later retitled Hoodlums, in which Robinson appeared alongside T. Life, Cissy Houston, and Jean Smart in her first credited screen role.

In 1980, Robinson moved to Ariola Records, where Schatz had become COO, though he did not produce her there. At his direction, she recorded at Muscle Shoals Sound Studio with producers Clayton Ivey and Terry Woodford, resulting in the single "Nothin' But a Heartache," a recording of a Michael McDonald composition and her only Ariola release. She subsequently recorded dance music on several independent labels, including Prelude, Promise, Perfect, and Profile Records. A dance version of "To Sir with Love," released on Profile, became a surprise top ten hit in Australia in 1984. Her 1984 remake of "Everlasting Love" was her last studio recording for nearly fifteen years, with the exception of "Grab Them Cakes," a 1985 duet with professional wrestler Junkyard Dog released on The Wrestling Album, accompanied by a music video featuring Cyndi Lauper miming guitar.

Concurrent with her recording work, Robinson built a substantial career as a session and jingle singer. She sang background on Irene Cara's 1980 hit "Fame" and later provided backing vocals for Michael Bolton and Cher. Her jingle work encompassed campaigns for Wrigley's Doublemint, Maybelline, Downy, Hanes, New York Bell, and Folgers coffee. From 1987 to 1988, she supplied the singing voices for the characters Rapture and Minx in the animated television series Jem.

Gloria Estefan's 1994 recording of "Turn the Beat Around" renewed public interest in Robinson, prompting her to re-record the song as the B-side of her 1995 single "For Real" and leading to a series of television appearances and new projects. She contributed backing vocals to RuPaul's 1996 album Foxy Lady and recorded a duet with RuPaul for the same project. In 1997, she recorded "House of Joy" for DJ and producer Junior Vasquez, which became her first and only charting single in the United Kingdom. That same year she recorded "My Stomp, My Beat" for the film Chasing Amy and appeared as herself in Comedy Central's mock documentary Unauthorized Biography: Milo, Death of a Supermodel. A broader revival of interest in disco during the mid-1990s brought Robinson together with KC and the Sunshine Band, Thelma Houston, Gloria Gaynor, and the Village People for a world tour. In 2011, Gold Legion.com digitally remastered and reissued Robinson's four RCA albums on CD with bonus tracks and liner notes. Robinson died on April 27, 2000.