Sylvia Robinson

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Sylvia Robinson (born Sylvia Vanderpool, March 6, 1936 in New York City) is a singer, musician and producer.

Her first successful record was the 1957 hit, "Love Is Strange", written by Bo Diddley and released as part of the duo Mickey & Sylvia with guitarist Mickey Baker. She married Joe Robinson in 1964 and continued working in the music business, being involved with several more successful releases. As a solo performer and billed as Sylvia she released the single "Pillow Talk" in 1973, a song she had originally hoped would be recorded by Al Green, who turned it down. After the song sat long in limbo, she recorded it on her own and her rendition reached number one on the R&B chart and number three on the pop chart, and is an early example of disco music. The vocals are replete with moaning and heavy breathing, predating Donna Summer's implied orgasms on "Love to Love You Baby." In the 1970s the Robinsons founded Sugar Hill Records. Prior to this, she owned All Platinum Records, releasing records for Soul artists such as Donnie Elbert and Shirley Goodman ("Shame, Shame, Shame", credited to Shirley & Company).

Arguably her most important contribution to the music industry was masterminding the formation of The Sugarhill Gang and the release of their hit, "Rapper's Delight" in 1979, the first commercially successful rap single. The group was discovered in Englewood, New Jersey, where Sugar Hill Records was based.

By commercializing the market for rap records, Sylvia Robinson is accredited as the mother of modern hip hop. The song "Rapper's Delight" brought rap onto the public music scene. Some suggest that the industry of music making was changed when this song was made, although many argue a bigger contributing factor was the introduction of drum machines and sequencers circa 1982.

In the 1980s, the Robinsons bought the Chess Records catalog and several years later sold the catalog to MCA Records. Their son, Joey Robinson, was a member of rap act, West Street Mob.

Her grandson ([1]) Darnell Robinson's $300,000 15th birthday party was featured on an episode of MTV's My Super Sweet Sixteen.

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