Dr. James Robinson (born 1948, Maine) is an American

filk music Filk music is a musical culture, genre, and community tied to Science fiction fandom, science fiction, fantasy, and horror fandom and a type of fan labor. The genre has existed since the early 1950s and been played primarily since the mid-197 ...

songwriter A songwriter is a person who creates musical compositions or writes lyrics for songs, or both. The writer of the music for a song can be called a composer, although this term tends to be used mainly in the classical music genre and film scoring. ...

and performer (known as Dr. Jane Robinson prior to 2004

sex reassignment surgery Gender-affirming surgery (GAS) is a surgical procedure, or series of procedures, that alters a person's physical appearance and sexual characteristics to resemble those associated with their gender identity. The phrase is most often associat ...

) whose songs focus on scientific themes, particularly

paleontology Paleontology, also spelled as palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of the life of the past, mainly but not exclusively through the study of fossils. Paleontologists use fossils as a means to classify organisms, measure ge ...

. Robinson earned a

doctorate A doctorate (from Latin ''doctor'', meaning "teacher") or doctoral degree is a postgraduate academic degree awarded by universities and some other educational institutions, derived from the ancient formalism '' licentia docendi'' ("licence to teach ...

biology Biology is the scientific study of life and living organisms. It is a broad natural science that encompasses a wide range of fields and unifying principles that explain the structure, function, growth, History of life, origin, evolution, and ...

from

UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Its academic roots were established in 1881 as a normal school then known as the southern branch of the C ...

in 1976, and went on to teach at the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...

. His filk albums include ''Dr. Jane's Science Notes'' (later reissued as ''Wackademia''), ''Fossil Fever'', ''Bedlam Cats'', ''Midlife Crisis'' and ''Dr. Jane's Remains''. Robinson has won two

Pegasus Award The Pegasus Award is the premier award for filk music and is annually hosted at the Ohio Valley Filk Fest (OVFF). Awards The Pegasus Awards were founded to recognize and honor excellence in filking. As science fiction (sci-fi) became better k ...

s (2000, Best End of the World Song, for "Out of a Clear Blue Sky"; and 1992, Best Writer/Composer); and has been nominated an additional 14 times. Robinson was inducted into the

Filk Hall of Fame Filk music is a musical culture, genre, and community tied to science fiction, fantasy, and horror fandom and a type of fan labor. The genre has existed since the early 1950s and been played primarily since the mid-1970s. The genre has a nic ...

in 2000. Robinson's life partner was the late Cynthia McQuillin, who reportedly said, upon meeting James for the first time, "At last I get to meet the man I fell in love with!" He lives in

Oakland Oakland is a city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area in the U.S. state of California. It is the county seat and most populous city in Alameda County, with a population of 440,646 in 2020. A major West Coast port, Oakland is ...

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

.LosCon 34 Program book
(page 64) A book of songs by Robinson as "Dr. Jane", ''Dr. Jane's Songs'', ("all of Dr. Jane's songs that Dr. Jim Robinson could find in his archives, plus a few that Lee Gold found from other sources") was compiled and published by

Lee Gold Lee Gold is a member of California science fiction fandom and a writer and editor in the role-playing game and filk music communities. Role-playing games Gold became prominent after 1975 as the editor of ''Alarums and Excursions'', a monthly ...

in 2012.Dr. Jane's Songs

, ed.

Guest of Honor appearances

Robinson has been a Guest of Honor (or similar position, e.g., Toastmaster) at over half a dozen conventions, including both Filk-Music-specific conventions: *Counterpoint Too! (the second NEFilk con) *

FilKONtario FilKONtario is a fan-run convention in the Greater Toronto Area, Ontario area dedicated to filk, the music of science fiction and fantasy fandom. Established in 1991, it is the only filk convention in Canada. In its fifth year (1995), the conve ...

2003 * Consonance 1994 (Toastmaster, responsible for introducing other guests but also entertaining the membership with a concert performance), and non-filk conventions: * Marcon 39 * Capricon XXIV *

Norwescon Norwescon is one of the largest regional science fiction and fantasy conventions in the United States. Located in SeaTac in Washington state, Norwescon has been running continuously since 1978. "Norwescon" was also the name of the 8th World S ...

XVII * ConFurence 8 (Furry convention) *

Loscon The Los Angeles Science Fantasy Society, Inc., or LASFS, is a science fiction and fantasy fan society that meets in the Los Angeles area. The current meeting place can be found on thLASFS website LASFS is the oldest continuously operating scienc ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Robinson, James 21st-century American biologists American paleontologists Filkers American LGBTQ singers American LGBTQ songwriters American transgender men American transgender musicians Transgender male singers University of California, Berkeley faculty University of California, Los Angeles alumni Singers from Maine 1948 births Living people Songwriters from Maine LGBTQ people from Maine Singer-songwriters from California