Bobby Holcomb
Bobby Holcomb (1947–1991) was an artist and musician who wrote popular Polynesian tunes.
Biography
Bobby Holcomb was born in 1947 in Honolulu, Hawaii, the son of an African-American father from Georgia, and a Hawaiian-Portuguese mother.
In the early 1970s, he travelled extensively through Asia, Europe and the Americas. In France, he performed with French pop groups such as Zig Zag Community and Johane of Arch, and he collaborated with French artists Sylvain Duplant, Jean-Pierre Auffredo and Éric Estève. He moved to Tahiti in 1976, and settled on the island of Huahine and learned the Tahitian language. He began composing songs in the Polynesian language, and combined traditional Polynesian melodies with reggae and popular rhythms. He became known to audiences simply as "Bobby". Most of his songs were written in Polynesian, but he also used French and English for some lyrics. His most popular song in Tahiti was "Orio", produced 1985.
In addition to music, he was also a painter and painted many murals and paintings.
He was passionate about Tahitian culture, and taught local children their cultural heritage. He campaigned against nuclear testing. For his educational efforts, he was named French Polynesia's Personality of the Year in 1988.
He died from cancer on February 15, 1991. Local Tahitian television stations treated his death as a matter of great national importance.
Collaboration with Jimmy Buffett
One of Holcomb's most famous tunes in the United States is "One Particular Harbour", which he co-wrote with American singer-songwriter Jimmy Buffett in 1983. The song appears on Buffett's album of the same title and is performed live at nearly all of his concerts.
Paintings
The book Varua Tupu (2006) contains several of Holcomb's paintings.
One of Holcomb's most popular paintings is "The Kites of Mata'Irea" depicting native Polynesians flying kites.
Discography
Holcomb never signed with a major label, and his early music was mostly produced on cassettes. The albums that did make their way to compact disc are out of print, and used copies are very rare. Tahitian television made some videos of Holcomb performing his tunes in the 1980s, and some of those videos can be found on the internet, on sites such as YouTube.
External links
- Amazon CD
- Site with several Holcomb paintings
- Book with Holcomb paintings
- Video of Porinetia on YouTube
- The Kites of Mata’Irea painting
- Holcomb painting
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Artists | |
| People | |
| Other | |
- 1947 births
- Musicians from Hawaii
- American male composers
- 20th-century American painters
- American male painters
- 1991 deaths
- Deaths from cancer in French Polynesia
- African-American people
- American people of Portuguese descent
- American emigrants to French Polynesia
- 20th-century American composers
- 20th-century American male musicians