Robin Sylvester is a London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

 born musician

Musician

A musician is an artist who plays a musical instrument. It may or may not be the person's profession. Musicians can be classified by their roles in performing music and writing music.Also....* A person who makes music a profession....

, living in San Francisco, who is best known for his ongoing work with RatDog

Ratdog

RatDog , is an American rock band. The group began as a side project for Grateful Dead rhythm guitarist Bob Weir and bassist Rob Wasserman. After the Grateful Dead disbanded in December 1995, following the death of Jerry Garcia on August 9, 1995, RatDog became Bob Weir's primary band...

. Although primarily a bass

Bass guitar

The bass guitar is a stringed instrument played primarily with the fingers or thumb , or by using a pick....

 player, he plays several instruments, including the guitar

Guitar

The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...

 and keyboards, and has done extensive arranging.

Sylvester began his professional music career with the acapella London Boy Singers chorus in the 1950s, and as an sound engineer

Audio engineering

An audio engineer, also called audio technician, audio technologist or sound technician, is a specialist in a skilled trade that deals with the use of machinery and equipment for the recording, mixing and reproduction of sounds. The field draws on many artistic and vocational areas, including...

 in 1969. Working as an assistant at Abbey Road Studios

Abbey Road Studios

Abbey Road Studios is a recording studio located at 3 Abbey Road, St John's Wood, City of Westminster, London, England. It was established in November 1931 by the Gramophone Company, a predecessor of British music company EMI, its present owner...

 when The Beatles

The Beatles

The Beatles were an English rock band, active throughout the 1960s and one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music. Formed in Liverpool, by 1962 the group consisted of John Lennon , Paul McCartney , George Harrison and Ringo Starr...

 recorded their eponymous album, he was inspired by Paul McCartney

Paul McCartney

Sir James Paul McCartney, MBE, Hon RAM, FRCM is an English musician, singer-songwriter and composer. Formerly of The Beatles and Wings , McCartney is listed in Guinness World Records as the "most successful musician and composer in popular music history", with 60 gold discs and sales of 100...

 to take up the bass guitar. He also used early synthesisers while playing with and producing Byzantium

Byzantium (band)

Byzantium were an English psychedelic music band of the 1970s who released three albums and performed one Peel Session. They are perhaps best remembered for their role in the early careers of Shane Fontayne, David Hentschel, Chas Jankel and Robin Sylvester....

 in 1971. While touring with Dana Gillespie

Dana Gillespie

Dana Gillespie is an English actress and singer.-Career:Gillespie was born to the Baron De Winterstein Gillespie, an Austrian radiologist, and his wife. She grew up in England and her family's villa in Maccagno, a village on Lake Maggiore, Italy...

, he moved to the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 in 1974. Clive Davis

Clive Davis

Clive Davis is an American record producer and music industry executive. He has won five Grammy Awards and is a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a non-performer. From 1967 to 1973 he was the President of Columbia Records. He was the founder and president of Arista Records from 1975...

 signed his folk-rock band The Movies to Arista Records

Arista Records

Arista was an American record label. It was a wholly owned subsidiary of Sony Music Entertainment and operated under the RCA Music Group. The label was founded in 1974 by Clive Davis, who formerly worked for CBS Records...

, which played around New York and Los Angeles in the late 1970s. Then, as a session musician, he worked alongside Steve Douglas

Steve Douglas (saxophonist)

Steven Douglas Kreisman , better known as Steve Douglas, was an American saxophonist, flautist and clarinetist. Douglas is best known as a Los Angeles session musician, a member of The Wrecking Crew, who worked with Phil Spector, Brian Wilson and The Beach Boys...

, backing the Beach Boys and Ry Cooder

Ry Cooder

Ryland Peter "Ry" Cooder is an American guitarist, singer and composer. He is known for his slide guitar work, his interest in roots music from the United States, and, more recently, his collaborations with traditional musicians from many countries.His solo work has been eclectic, encompassing...

. He also played in live acts led by Marty Balin

Marty Balin

Marty Balin is an American musician. He is best known as the founder and one of the lead singers of the psychedelic rock band Jefferson Airplane.-Early life:Martyn Buchwald was born in Cincinnati, Ohio...

, Mary Wells

Mary Wells

Mary Esther Wells was an American singer who helped to define the emerging sound of Motown in the early 1960s...

, The Shirelles

The Shirelles

The Shirelles were an African-American girl group that achieved popularity in the early 1960s. They consisted of schoolmates Shirley Owens , Doris Coley , Addie "Micki" Harris , and Beverly Lee...

, The Coasters

The Coasters

The Coasters are an American rhythm and blues/rock and roll vocal group that had a string of hits in the late 1950s. Beginning with "Searchin'" and "Young Blood", their most memorable songs were written by the songwriting and producing team of Leiber and Stoller...

, The Drifters

The Drifters

The Drifters are a long-lived American doo-wop and R&B/soul vocal group with a peak in popularity from 1953 to 1963, though several splinter Drifters continue to perform today. They were originally formed to serve as Clyde McPhatter's backing group in 1953...

, Billy Preston

Billy Preston

William Everett "Billy" Preston was a musician who gained notoriety and fame, first as a session musician for the likes of Sam Cooke, Ray Charles and The Beatles, and later finding fame as a solo artist with hits such as "Space Race", "Will It Go Round in Circles" and "Nothing from...

, Christine McVie

Christine McVie

Christine McVie is an English rock singer, keyboardist, and songwriter. Her primary fame came as a member of the British/American rock band Fleetwood Mac, though she has also released three solo albums...

, Steve Seskin

Steve Seskin

Steve Seskin is an American songwriter whose compositions have been recorded by Alabama, Kenny Chesney, Peter Frampton, Waylon Jennings, Brian McComas, Neal McCoy, Tim McGraw, John Michael Montgomery, Colin Raye, Tebey and Mark Wills...

, Bo Diddley

Bo Diddley

Ellas Otha Bates , known by his stage name Bo Diddley, was an American rhythm and blues vocalist, guitarist, songwriter , and inventor...

, Chuck Berry

Chuck Berry

Charles Edward Anderson "Chuck" Berry is an American guitarist, singer, and songwriter, and one of the pioneers of rock and roll music. With songs such as "Maybellene" , "Roll Over Beethoven" , "Rock and Roll Music" and "Johnny B...

, Freddy Fender

Freddy Fender

Freddy Fender , born Baldemar Garza Huerta in San Benito, Texas, United States, was a Mexican-American Tejano, country and rock and roll musician, known for his work as a solo artist and in the groups Los Super Seven and the Texas Tornados...

, Del Shannon

Del Shannon

Del Shannon was an American rock and roll singer-songwriter who had a No. 1 hit, "Runaway", in 1961.- Biography :...

, and Vince Welnick

Vince Welnick

Vince Welnick was an American keyboardist, best known for playing with the band The Tubes during the 1970s and 1980s and with the Grateful Dead in the 1990s.-Music career:...

's Missing Man Formation

Missing Man Formation (band)

Missing Man Formation was a band put together by former Grateful Dead keyboardist Vince Welnick, featuring Welnick and an ever-changing group of musicians, including Steve Kimock on guitar , Prairie Prince on drums , Bobby Vega on bass...

.

In 2003, he replaced Rob Wasserman

Rob Wasserman

Rob Wasserman is an American bass player, who has played with a wide variety of musicians including David Grisman, Lou Reed, Bob Weir, Jerry Garcia, Bruce Cockburn, Van Morrison, Rickie Lee Jones, Brian Wilson, Elvis Costello, Mark Morris, Aaron Neville, Chris Whitley, Studs Terkel, Pete Seeger,...

 as RatDog's bass player. He played his first show on 4 March 2003.
He missed RatDog's 2010 shows in Jamaica

Jamaica

Jamaica is an island nation of the Greater Antilles, in length, up to in width and 10,990 square kilometres in area. It is situated in the Caribbean Sea, about south of Cuba, and west of Hispaniola, the island harbouring the nation-states Haiti and the Dominican Republic...

 due to health concerns; Wasserman substituted.

He continues to play occasional shows with jam band

Jam band

-Ambiguity:By the late 1990s use of the term jam band also became ambiguous. An editorial at jamband.com suggested that any band of which a primary band such as Phish has done a cover of be included as jam band. The example was including New York post-punk band Talking Heads after Phish performed...

 alumni like Ghosts of Electricity, Melvin Seals

Melvin Seals

Melvin Seals is an American musician, best known as a long time member of the Jerry Garcia Band.-Early life and career:...

 and JGB

JGB (band)

JGB is an American rock band led by Melvin Seals, who plays electric organ. Its mission is to continue the musical legacy of the Jerry Garcia Band, of which Seals was a long time member.-History:...

, David Nelson & Friends

David Nelson (musician)

David Nelson is an American guitarist and musician.Although he started his musical career playing folk and bluegrass music Nelson is probably best known as one of the original members of psychedelic country rock band the New Riders of the Purple Sage...

, Jemimah Puddleduck

Jemimah Puddleduck

Jemimah Puddleduck is an American rock band led by Bob Weir & RatDog lead guitarist Mark Karan. In addition to Karan the band also includes Billy Lee Lewis on drums, Bob Gross or Robin Sylvester on bass and John "JT" Thomas or Mookie Siegel on keyboards....

, and the Rubber Souldiers

Rubber Souldiers

Rubber Souldiers is a Beatles jam band consisting of David Gans, Chris Rowan, and Lorin Rowan.-About:The band’s origins are somewhat serendipitous. An impromptu rendition of “Baby’s In Black” during a sound check led to an entire afternoon of jamming, one Beatles tune after another...

.