We Still Miss Bob McCoy
#207 / Flood Time Capsule: 2010
We didn’t get to enjoy Bob McCoy’s companionship nearly long enough — we knew him for only about five years — but he had an enormous impact on the Family Flood.
The perpetually smiling Floridian was the embodiment of a truth most musicians learn: that in the room where the music happens, devoted listeners are as important as the players themselves.
Bob in the Room
Bob couldn’t jam with us — he was only starting to learn guitar at the time of his death 13 years ago this week — but, beginning in 2006, he and his wife, JoAnn, were often in the room for the weekly Flood gatherings, sharing jokes and stories, smiling at our progress on their favorite tunes.
And the pair was on hand for some important Flood events.
For instance, they were there on the October evening in 2007 when 14-year-old guitarist Jacob Scarr first started jamming with the bunch of us. We still remember Bob leaning over and whispering to Charlie and Doug as he and JoAnn left that evening, “You guys've got to really try to hold on to him.”
They returned the next week, happy to see we obviously agreed. (Jacob played with the band for the next four years, right up to the night before his departure for college in 2011.)
Bob and the Podcast
Bob McCoy was also there in May 2008 for the first time we started recording the weekly jam sessions, using our new ZOOM digital recorder. That technology enabled us to launch our weekly podcasts later that year. One of the first podcast listeners was Bob when he and JoAnn returned to Florida that December.
“Great!” he said. “Now we’ll have fresh Flood music to see us through the winter.”
A little over a year later, we were to dedicate a podcast to Bob himself, featuring one of his all-time favorites, Tom Paxton’s “Ramblin’ Boy.” Click the button below to hear it:
Bob and JoAnn couldn’t attend as often as they liked — they lived half the year in St. Cloud, FL, south of Orlando, coming north in the summer and fall to escape the heat — but they came as often as they could.
Racing to the Jam Session
Sometimes they even challenged traffic regulations along the way, just to reach the room before the music started. For instance, for what turned out to be one of the last sessions Bob ever attended — Oct. 21, 2009 — he and JoAnn drove straight through from Columbia, SC, just to make the jam.
It just so happened that our photographer friend Larry Kendall was there too and took the picture above. We love how it captures Bob resting in the big blue chair at the left as the music flows all around him.
Bob’s Buddha Nature
Bob was an Ohioan born and bred, but he always seemed more attuned to sand and the sea. He loved Florida and Hawaii, and the McCoys took the Bowens to see some of his favorite sites in both states.
Bob also nurtured some Buddhist inclinations. Another memorable trip the two couples took was to Indiana for four days of teachings in Bloomington by the Dalai Lama.
After that, Bob added to his new Facebook page a cherished quote from The Buddha, one that especially resonated with us after Bob’s death:
Thousands of candles can be lit from a single candle, and the life of the candle will
not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared.
Bob was always active. He served four years in the Air Force during the Vietnam War era. He earned bachelors and masters degrees at Miami University of Oxford, Ohio, and a CPA license in Florida. He starred a restoration and remodeling business, and he was a home builder, like his father.
It was a lot in a short time.
Bob was 66 when he died of a heart attack on May 11, 2010, in an Ashland, KY, hospital. He and JoAnn had just returned from St. Cloud and, after a long winter’s absence, they were looking forward to seeing their Flood family the next night.
We will never forget you, Bob. Mahalo nui loa, old buddy.