Robert Kirby

Infobox musical artist

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Name = Robert Kirby
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Background = non_vocal_instrumentalist
Birth_name = Robert Kirby
Alias =
Born = 1948
Died =
Origin = Flagicon|UK
Instrument = keyboards
Voice_type =
Genre = progressive rock
Occupation = arranger, musician
Years_active = 1960s - present
Label = A&M
Associated_acts = Nick Drake, Strawbs
URL =
Notable_instruments =

Robert Kirby (Born 1948) is a British born arranger of string sections for Rock and Folk music. He is best known for his work on the Nick Drake albums Five Leaves Left and Bryter Layter, but has also worked with Ralph McTell, Paul Weller, Elvis Costello and Flemming. He has a son Henry Kirby who is also actively involved in music, his rock band, The Absolutes, have played in various venues in London and are rapidly rising in the scene of London bands.

At Cambridge

Patrick Humphries' book "Way To Blue" gives some details of Robert Kirby's time at university.He sang in a group called "The Gentle Power of Song". His tutor once told him that his compositions sounded like a breakfast cereal commercial. This was intended as an insult, but Robert took this as his high praise: "As good as that, eh?" Robert went to Caius college, Cambridge and made friends with Paul Wheeler. They were both members of the Caius Breakfast Club, also called "The Loungers". There were few rules. You had to have a Loungers' breakfast on Sundays, and 'stand by ye gate once a day and observe what strange creatures God hath made'. There was a rule that permitted an outsider (the 'Oddefellowe') to become a member. Robert and Paul were both friends with Nick Drake so they invited him to be the Oddefellowe. There is a line in Nick's songs "Way To blue" which seems to echo one of the rules of the Loungers:

"We will wait at your gate, hoping like the blind".

The May Ball

Kirby recruited eight musicians (seven women and one man) to play alongside Nick Drake at the Caius May Ball. Robert wore evening dress, and the seven women wore black ankle-length dresses with white feather boas. They performed in the library. Four of the songs were with the string orchestra and a couple of others were Nick solo. After every third song, they played classical music (Leopold Mozart and Albinoni).

Five Leaves Left

When Joe Boyd recruited Nick Drake to record an album, he already had a string arranger in mind, Richard Hewson. Nick rejected the few Hewson arrangements and announced that he already had a friend at university who could do a better job - Robert Kirby. Nick had decided to leave university without completing his final year. When Robert was offered the contract to arrange music for an entire album he too gave up Cambridge university. Though Kirby arranged and conducted strings for "Five Leaves", Harry Robinson was commissioned to arrange the strings for "River Man".

"The first strong memory I have of Nick was at the second or third session for 'Five Leaves Left'". Richard Hewson, a well known arranger, and a fifteen piece orchestra had been brought in to arrange Nick's songs. "Nick started getting hotter and hotter under the collar. He was very young and he had struck me as a person you could push about. Some people in a recording session will do whatever you tell them. But he was getting quietly more and more aggravated, and in the end he dug his heels in and dismissed the arrangements. He said he'd get this friend at Cambridge, Robert Kirby, he thought would be much more sympathetic to what he was doing. Robert had never before done anything in his life in a recording studio. But two weeks later we booked him together with a bunch of musicians- a smaller bunch than the first time, I remember... We were flabbergasted. He was so good"
- John Wood, sound engineer for Five Leaves Left

Life as an arranger

Although Robert had recorded arrangements for over 40 albums by 1978, it was a struggle to make ends meet. In the end he decided to work in marketing industry instead. He is rumoured still to have his scores for Nick's records in his mother's potting shed. (He also was for three years, 1975-1978 one of the 2 keyboard players for Strawbs, touring the UK and internationally, and getting some composing credits on the albums Deep Cuts, Deadlines and Burning for You.) He has since done some further arranging for Strawbs in 2001 Baroque & Roll and 2004 Deja Fou.

Namesakes

There are other people with the same name. Robert Kirby (Edward Norris) (1911 - 2002) was an American crime novelist. There is a Robert Kirby who is a columnist for Utah's Salt Lake City Tribune. There is also a Robert Kirby that lives in Huntington, WV. The website www.brainyquote.com lists many cynical remarks by "Robert Kirby", "Born 1948", "British musician". However most of the quotations are from an American perspective, and some relate to paleontology. Several of these quotations are mis-attributions, originally appearing in the work of the columnist from Utah, and are verifiable in the archives of the Salt Lake Tribune.

Public performances of Nick Drake's music

On July 2, 2005, Kirby conducted an 18-piece orchestra in Manhattan's Central Park for a show of Nick Drake's music, using his original scores. "Five Leaves Left" was performed in its entirety as well as excerpts from "Bryter Later" and "Made To Love Magic". The show starred guitarist Josh Max and singer Julie James of the Manhattan-based group The Maxes, and was attended by 3,000 Drake fans from all over the U.S.A.

Discography

*Nick Drake: Five Leaves Left (1969)
*Nick Drake: Bryter Layter (1970)
*Vashti Bunyan: Just Another Diamond Day (1970)
*Bernie Taupin: Bernie Taupin (1970)
*Shelagh McDonald: Stargazer (1971)
*Audience: The House On The Hill (1971)
*Gillian McPherson: Poets And Painters And PErformers of Blues (1971)
*Ralph McTell: You Well-Meaning Brought Me Here (1971)
*Keith Christmas: Pigmy (1971)
*Tim Hart and Maddy Prior: Summer solstice (1971)
*Cochise: So Far (1971)
*Steve Gibbons: Short Stories (1971)
*Andy Roberts: Nina and the Dream Tree (1971)
*John Kongos: John Kongos (1971)
*Spirogyra: St. Radigunds (1971)
*Elton John: Madman Across The Water (1971)
*Claggers: Chumley's Laughing Gear (1971)
*Strawbs: Grave New World (1972)
*David Ackles: American Gothic (1972)
*Mick Audsley: Dark and Devil Waters (1972)
*B.J. Cole: the New Hovering Dog (1972)
*David Elliott: David Elliott (1972)
*Dave Cousins: Two Weeks Last Summer (1972)
*Strawbs: Bursting at the Seams (1972)
*Mike Silver: Troubadour (1973)
*Lindsay DePaul: Surprise (1973)
*Steve Ashley: Stroll On (1974)
*Steve Ashley: Speedy Return (1975)
*John Cale: Helen of Troy (1975)
*Gary Shearston: The Greatest show on Earth (1975)
*Richard Digance: Trading the Boards (1975)
*Chris DeBurgh: Spanish Train and Other Stories (1975)
*Strawbs: Deep Cuts (1976)
*Spriguns: Time Will Pass (1977)
*Sandy Denny: Rendez Vous (1977)
*Strawbs: Burning for You (1977)
*Strawbs: Deadlines (1978)
*Arthur Brown: Chisholm in my Bosom (1978)
*Richard and Linda Thompson: First Light (1978)
*Roger McGough: Summer With Monika (1978)
*Iain Matthews: Stealin' Home (1978)
*Elvis Costello: Almost Blue (1982)
*Nick Lowe: Nick Lowe and his Cowboy Outfit (1984)
*Any Trouble: Wrong Eng of the Race (1984)
*The London Symphony Orchestra: Screen Classics, vol 7 (1994)
*Catchers: Stooping to Fit (1998)
*Ben and Jason: Hello (1999)
*Paul Weller: Heliocentric (2000)
*Acoustic Strawbs: Baroque & Roll (2001)
*Nick Drake: Made to Love Magic (2004)
*Strawbs: Déjà Fou (2004)
*Vashti Bunyan: Lookaftering (2005)
*The Magic Numbers: Those The Brokes (2006)
*a balladeer: Panama (2006)
*Linda Thompson (singer): Versatile Heart (2007)

References