Up and Comer

Those Diner Moments -- With Singing Waitress Sharon Robinson

by Arline Chandler

Several years ago, a lady, fashionably dressed in an impeccable white pantsuit, joined an older man for supper at the Hard Luck Diner in Branson, Missouri. Singing waitress, Sharon Robinson noted the woman's strong resemblance to country music's legendary "Coal Miner's Daughter."

As they finished their meal, she could not resist walking over to ask, "Has anybody ever told you that you look like Loretta Lynn?"

In an unmistakable hill country twang, the dark-haired lady replied, "You know, honey, I've been told that all my life!"

Meeting celebrities is one of Sharon's job perks at the Hard Luck Diner. She's served Barbara Mandrell and Tony Orlando, the Osmonds and the Lennons. On occasion, the Oak Ridge Boys drop in.

"When the Legends performed at the Grand Palace, they would come in make-up and stay in character," she says. "Sometimes, 'Elvis' sang. Or the Blues Brothers danced with customers.

"I always tell the people I serve to keep their cameras ready because the Blues Brothers and Dolly Parton once had lunch at their table!" the golden-haired singer continues.

But Sharon's hallmark moments are happy tears in the eyes of her dining audience. Or an older couple reaching across a table to hold hands when she sings their favorite love song. She knows she's made an emotional contact.

"Our customers come back and bring their families, their grandkids, and friends," she says. "And they send people. I have folks say, "My brother back in Pennsylvania said when I get to Branson I need to find the Hard Luck Diner.' They find us, then share us with friends."

As early as age six, Sharon knew for certain that she wanted to be a Metropolitan Opera singer. From the radio in her Forsyth, Missouri, home every Saturday, classical opera shaped her singing path. She grew older and formed a singing group with her cousins. They performed at all the events typical of small-town America: church and school, choir contests, and talent shows.

At her alma mater, College of the Ozarks at Lookout Point, Missouri, she spent three years singing Italian and German arias to perfect her tones without concentrating on the lyrics. Despite her preference for classical music, she worked during the summers as a saloon girl at Silver Dollar City, an 1890s theme park near Branson, Missouri.

"Even now, I'm inclined toward classical music," she says. "But after college graduation, jobs singing pop music were easier to find. From that time, until age 40, I held a job in music or some aspect of entertainment."

Fresh out of college, Sharon, a young son in tow, headed for Gulfport, Mississippi, where she landed jobs at two theme parks. She first called on her experience at the Silver Dollar Saloon and worked in its Wild West Shows. After a couple of years, she worked into a small animal show in the theme park and started training tropical birds, chickens, ducks, goats, and pigs. Later, she worked with dolphins and sea lions. For close to eleven years, she stayed with that company, traveling to perform shows from Tennessee to New Jersey, and outside the States to Acapulco, Mexico.

"I turned my son into a gypsy," she says with a laugh, noting that he burned out on rides in theme parks. "He turned out so good despite such a flaky mom!"

When Sharon hit mid-life, she decided it was time to get a "real" job. "I had basically been playing," she says. "The animal shows were fun. I traveled to great places and met wonderful people. But it wasn't like working. I determined to get serious."

Educating herself to do medical records and file insurance claims, she managed doctors' offices several years in Huntsville, Alabama, and Daytona, Florida. In Huntsville, she met Steve Robinson, an aerospace engineer. Soon after their marriage, Sharon brought him back to Missouri to meet her large family. "Just so he would not feel as though he was totally inundated with relatives, I suggested a visit to Silver Dollar City," she says. "He loved it and immediately wanted to move to Branson."

The couple returned to Huntsville and saved their money. The following November, they packed their clothes in a U-Haul, and moved to Missouri. In the spring, she accompanied Steve to Silver Dollar City's annual auditions where he interviewed for the job of blacksmith. Sharon waited in the hallway. Someone asked if she was there to interview for a singing waitress at the Hard Luck Diner. Although she already had several jobs lined up in the medical office management field, on a whim, she auditioned. On the spot, she was hired.

Although Sharon had worked in her early teens as a waitress in a hotel during Rockaway Beach's heyday, she never thought about combining that experience with singing. "When the medical offices called with job offers, I turned them down," she says. "I realized I'd much rather work in a place where everybody who comes in the door wants to be there."

At the Hard Luck Diner, each singer chooses the type of music he or she likes to sing, according to what's suited to the vocalist's voice. Sharon's repertoire includes music from the 1940s and '50s such as "I'll Be Seeing You," "As Time Goes By," "Unforgettable," and "Over the Rainbow." Her car turns into a rehearsal studio on the 30-minute drive to work from her home in the woods near Forsyth.

Each singer also chooses when to sing, balancing waiting on tables with the music. "First, we make sure we serve our dining guests," Sharon says. "A song is only a few minutes. But, three minutes, when your glass is empty, is a long time." She goes on to say that sometimes she performs several times during a two or three hour mealtime, but other times, if they are busy, she may sing only once.

Working at one of the few places in the country where wait staff has to audition vocally to get a job, Sharon says the restaurant floor is an excellent training ground. "We learn to handle things very quickly," she says with a laugh. Sharon enjoys the immediate feedback from her audience. "It's different from being on a stage with lights in my eyes," she continues. "I'm right there almost in my audience's lap. A person, who can sing at the Hard Luck Diner, can sing anywhere. Because of the clanking dishes, crying babies, people jostling the wait staff, we learn to weed out distractions and focus on what we're doing.

"We never know what may happen. Someone may try to feed us ice cream while we're singing. So we learn to be flexible."

Sharon doesn't know if her moments at the Diner will lead anywhere else. "Most of us who work here have already been in shows," she says. "Two years ago, I was in "The Golden Girls," at Country Tonite. I took a leave of absence from the Diner and worked that show until it closed for the season. The theater did not renew the contracts."

She says that everyone who works at the Hard Luck keeps an eye out for auditions and when one comes up, they often try out together. "We're not competing against each other," she continues. "The producers have something specific in mind--a type of voice, a certain look, tall, short, soprano, alto, or tenor. We become a cheering section for each other."

She has kept count of people who move from the Diner into shows. "Over the last seven years," she notes, "we've had 44 people who have landed show jobs."

Looking back on her career, Sharon says, "One thing leads to another and you don't know when you start your journey where in the world you're going to end up. Who would have ever imagined a little girl with dreams of the opera would thrive on moments at a Diner?"

Copyright Arline Chandler