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After starting piano lessons at age 4 and playing in garage bands during his early teens in Meriden, Connecticut,
Rob moved to Philadelphia in the 70's to attend college at the University of Pennsylvania. It was here that he met
Eric Bazilian and Rick Chertoff, who would become his close friends and musical soul mates starting with a band called
Wax.
Since then, Rob has become known worldwide as a successful songwriter, musician, arranger and producer.
Rob and Eric co-founded The Hooters in 1980, extensively touring the Philadelphia area's clubs and colleges.
The Hooters began their rise to fame with an independent album release titled "Amore" that sold over 100,000 copies.
This led to their debut major label release "Nervous Night" on Columbia in 1985. This album sold in excess of
2 million copies and included Billboard Top 40 hits such as "Day By Day" (#18), "And We Danced" (#21)
and "Where Do The Children Go" (#38).
The Hooters had continued success with 5 more albums including "Hooterization - A Retrospective" Greatest Hits album
and "The Hooters - Live". The Hooters' albums attained Platinum and Gold status in the USA, Canada, Australia, Germany, Norway
and Sweden and toured all over the world through 1995. Highlights of Rob's career with The Hooters include the Live-Aid Concert 1985
in Philadelphia, Amnesty International Concert at Giants Stadium 1986, the Tokyo Dome 1987 and Roger Waters' extravaganza
at The Wall in Berlin 1990.
"Time After Time", co-written and sung with Cyndi Lauper, earned Rob a Grammy nomination for Song Of The Year in 1984,
and reached #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 Singles chart. "Time After Time" has been covered by over 50 artists including Miles Davis,
Willie Nelson, Matchbox 20, Everything But The Girl and Cassandra Wilson.
Joan Osborne's debut release, "Relish", provided Rob with the opportunity to write, play and arrange on the album
that was nominated for 5 Grammy awards in 1996, including Album Of The Year. The very successful production team reunited with Joan in 2004
to record the album "Little Wild One" released in 2008, with Rob serving as co-producer, playing a variety of instruments,
and co-writing many of the songs.
In 1998, Rob and Rick Chertoff gathered an all-star cast of musicians and friends, including Carole King, The Chieftains,
Taj Mahal, Cyndi Lauper, Joan Osborne and members of The Band among others for an epic musical project entitled "Largo".
The album, a creative exploration of American music, is currently being developed as a possible Broadway musical.
Rob's creative songwriting style was featured in the Ron Howard film "The Grinch". Rob co-wrote, co-produced,
arranged and played on "Christmas of Love" performed by Little Isidore and The Inquisitors.
He was also involved in songwriting projects with Bette Midler and a variety of other stage and film projects.
Rob co-wrote and performed on Ricky Martin's single "Private Emotion", featured on his 2000 debut release "Ricky Martin".
Following the completion in late 2002 of his state-of-the-art recording studio, Elm Street Studios in suburban Philadelphia,
Rob has successfully completed several projects there, and many more on the way. The studio combines vintage analog gear and the
latest digital recording equipment including Pro-Tools HD and houses Rob's extensive keyboard collection.
In 2002 Rob started working with Dar Williams, co-producing and playing on her album "The Beauty of the Rain" (2003)
and co-writing the single "Closer To You". This successful collaboration continued as he played keyboards on her
album "My Better Self" (2005) and co-wrote the single "Echoes" from that CD.
He also co-wrote the song "Summerday" on her album "Promised Land" (2008).
, as well as development projects
with several emerging new artists. Among these projects were the album "Dark Horses" for Billy Goodman he produced and released on the
Monocle Music label in early 2005 and an album with Shamsi Ruhe (2006), for which Rob played, co-produced, and co-wrote many of the songs.
The Hooters reunited in 2001 and once again embarked on very successful headlining European annual summer tours starting in in 2003. The band is
one of the most vital parts of Rob's musical life and continues to provide inspiration and productive opportunites to work with his long-term bandmates.
Following several years of writing and recording, Rob and Eric produced "Time Stand Still" (2007) the first new studio album from
The Hooters since 1993. The band played at venues in Europe and the U.S. throughout 2007 and 2008 and
released the two-CD album "Both Sides Live" in late 2008, the first live album released by The Hooters in the U.S.
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