Nell Robinson

Nell Robinson, born Hilary Perkins, adopted her grandmother’s name as her professional identity while pursuing work as a country and bluegrass vocalist. Years passed before she concluded that music represented her authentic path, a realization reached only after a childhood shaped by her father’s Air Force career and the resulting series of household relocations. The modest Alabama town that hosted her grandmothers Nell Robinson and Thelma Bates remained the single consistent anchor amid those shifts. Perkins participated in school singing as a child yet withheld her first public appearances until turning 46, after which she quickly bridged the interval by anchoring herself in the San Francisco bluegrass circuit through her band Red Level. She issued her initial recording, Loango, in 2009 on the independent Nell Robinson Music imprint she controlled, then followed it two years later with the self-released On the Brooklyn Road.