Robin Gibb: Bee Gees Disco Great Dies

Robin Gibb: Bee Gees Disco Great Dies

News/Tribute

I remember seeing Tavares open for the Bee Gees at Madison Square Garden back in 1977.  I remember that year because that’s when I graduated from High School.  I will never forget the performances by the Bee Gees and Tavares.  That night Disco had announced it had arrived as a music genre.  It was that night the Bee Gees and Tavares previewed and performed songs off of the Saturday Night Fever Soundtrack. 

I never saw so much glam, fashion, color and flair in one night, and I’m talking about the crowd.  Satin shirts, velvet suits, bell bottoms with Peter Max designs and platform shoes not to include accessories like gold chains, costume jewelry, pimp hats and furs.  But the artists kept it simpler.  The performances were electric and full of excitement.

Disco which started out as a Black and Gay club subculture, kicked the door open to Madison Square Garden via Hollywood on the power and performance of the Bee Gees music and the Queen of Disco, Donna Summer.  

You knew Disco crossed over watching Travolta’s performance in the movie Saturday Night Fever.  They put ‘Rocky’ in a white polyester suit and taught him to dance.  The rest is history.

Robin Gibb with his brothers produced 25 albums, Robin produced 8 albums not including his last one with his son RJ (Robert-John).  The last work Robin Gibb was working on was his first classical concert, "The Titanic Requiem," with his son Robin-John to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the disaster. (http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/robin-gibbs-death-latest-family-heartbreak/story?id=16394132#.T7v2X9xWrXo)

The Bee Gees have proven to be artists true to Rock and Pop Music in all its various forms.  The Bee Gees music has been covered by country artists like Kenny Rogers and the Gatlin Brothers to Rock and Roll Artists like Elvis Presley and Janis Joplin.   In 1978 the brothers Gibb illustrious recording career was at its best no less than 9 of the Billboards top 10 songs were written and/or performed by the Bee Gees. 

Robin Gibb and his brothers wrote many number 1 hits for some of the greatest recording artists of our time, including but not limited to; Diana Ross's "Chain Reaction", Tina Turner's "I Will Be There", and Barbra Streisand's "Guilty" and "Woman in Love", as well as songs "Heartbreaker" and "All the Love in the World" by Dionne Warwick. 

Robin Gibb and his brothers impact on all music has been profound.  Country music hits, "Islands in the Stream" by Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton, "Rest Your Love on Me" by Conway Twitty and "Buried Treasure" by Kenny Rogers (backing vocals The Gatlin  Brothers).  Donna Summer was indisputably the Queen of Disco.  Robin Gibb and his Brothers are no less than the Grand Dukes of Pop Music.

The only ‘words’ I can find to pay any form of tribute to Robin Gibb are the words of the Bee Gees:

Robin Gibb - December 22, 1949 to May 20, 2012

Talk in everlasting words

And dedicate them all to me

And I will give you all my life

I'm here if you should call to me

You think that I don't even mean

A single word I say

It's only words, and words are all

I have to take your heart away…

(from Words by the Bee Gees)

RJ