Bob Phillips, Alamosa’s music man, passed away over Easter Weekend on Saturday, April 19. He was 70.
Phillips operated Light Shine Music, audio-engineered pretty much every music and event that required sound in Alamosa and the San Luis Valley, and had his own band, Blue Sky.
“Very much like the pope’s passing. They were similar individuals…Loving and caring, supported the downtrodden,” said his friend and fellow musician, Rob “Robear” Bosdorf. “He was a kind, gentle person. He would have helped anybody.”
For the past two decades, Light Shine Music was where every kid who aspired to play an instrument or needed say, their clarinet worked on, would head to. When Adams State had an event, it was Phillips the university would turn to. The same with the concerts on San Juan Avenue or Cole Park in Alamosa, or pretty much anywhere else around the San Luis Valley.
Bob Phillips was the guy. The show couldn’t go on without him. Now it must.
“He touched a lot of people and let his light shine, no pun intended,” said his son, Josh Phillips.
Josh Phillips grew up working alongside his father and will work to keep Light Shine Music open. The store has meant so much.
“You learn as much as you can. It’s just like life. Learn as much as you can and do the best at it,” Josh Phillips said of his dad’s approach.
Originally from Tennessee, Bob Phillips moved to Alamosa after he got out of the Army in the mid-1970s to care for his mother and stepdad, his son said. He played the ukulele first, then progressed on to the guitar and just kept learning and learning and helping others and helping others.
“Everybody loved him, everybody knew him,” said his oldest son, Dan Hocker. “He took care of as many people as he possibly could, and then some.”
Phillips had been ill and in May of 2024 a benefit concert was held for him at Society Hall.
“I was so sorry to hear that my friend Bob Phillips passed away,” said Society Hall board member Don Richmond, who was emcee for the benefit show. “He was a patron saint and guardian angel of San Luis Valley musicians (and music lovers), always ready to jump in to help make something good happen, and he was a fine musician/guitarist/vocalist in his own right.
“But above and beyond all that, he was a man with a huge heart, from which he shut no one out, seemingly. I will miss him very much, as will his community. Play on, brother Bob.”
The family will plan a celebration of life event for Phillips, his sons said. In addition to his children, his wife, Michelle, survives him.