RIP Robbie Robertson

  They may have started off as Bob Dylan's backing band on tour in 1966 and the music recorded for the 1975 album, The Basement Tapes, but by the time they released their first album in 1968, Music From the Big Pink, the Band were primed to craft their own legacy.  Their second album, The Band, was even better.  Put together both albums, as well as The Basement Tapes, were landmarks of a new kind of roots music, Americana. 

  Robbie Robertson's songs were a major factor in making the Band pioneers of the genre. That's not to diminish the rest of the group.  Levon Helm, Rick Danko, Garth Hudson and Richard Manuel were superb talents.  

  Robertson wrote the majority of the Band's songs.  So, his major contributions of American roots music, later named Americana can't be denied.  A superb, but underrated guitarist, Robertson was blessed to have Helm, Danko and Hudson to bring his songs alive. 

  After the Band broke up in 1976, Robertson got into scoring music for films often for Martin Scorsese. In 1987 he released the first and best of his six solo albums. The self-titled Robbie Robertson. "Broken Arrow". "Somewhere Down The Crazy River" and "Showdown at Big Sky" are some of his best post-Band songs. 

  In the end, it's the songs he wrote with the Band that define his legacy.  There's no denying the brilliance of "The Weight", "Up On Cripple Creek". "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down", "Ophelia", "Rag Mama Rag", "Chest Fever", "Shape I'm In", "Arcadian Driftwood" and many more.