NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- Despite an 'incredible will to live,' country music singer Marty Robbins lost a six-day fight for life late Wednesday night and died from his third heart attack in 13 years. He was 57.
Robbins, whose ballad 'El Paso' earned him the first Grammy Award ever given a country entertainer, died at 11:15 p.m. CST in St. Thomas Hospital, where he underwent emergency bypass surgery last Thursday.
Robbins' wife, Marizona, and his children, Ronnie and Janet, were at the hospital when he died after his vital signs became very unstable earlier in the evening.
Chuck Morgan, a disc jockey on the 50,000-watt radio station WSM, immediately broadscast Robbins' death over the Music Country Network, carried by satellite to affiliate stations around the nation.
The reaction was almost instantaneous, he said.
'Everybody's been calling in -- there are a lot of upset fans. Mostly they wanted us to tell them it wasn't so. A lot of them were sad that they weren't going to see him any more,' Morgan said.
'Marty didn't have fan clubs as such, but he had some of the most loyal fans not only in country music, but any kind of music. If you said anything bad about Marty Robbins, they were ready to lynch.
Morgan said the network would play nothing but Robbins songs the rest of the night.
Robbins' death came after slight improvement in his vital signs earlier Wednesday, leading Jackson to say that 'all hope is not lost. But the odds are definitely pulling against him.'
Doctors had said that Robbins' 'incredible will to live' might be offsetting the odds.
However, Jackson said later that Robbins took a turn for the worse and 'he had been worsening all evening.'
Jackson said doctors attending Robbins had gone home after he died and did not comment. One doctor, who asked not to be identified, stayed with Robbins around the clock during his last hours.
Doctors earlier Wednesday called it a 'miracle' that Robbins, who had 18 No. 1 country hits, did not die from the attack last Thursday.
'Doctors say he is one of the few patients they have seen with this kind of heart attack survive surgery,' Jackson said. 'They kind of feel it is miraculous that he ever made it to surgery, much less survived.'
Robbins, inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame only two months ago, was admitted to St. Thomas Hospital Dec. 2 complaining of chest pains. Tests revealed a massive heart attack caused by a blood clot in one of the major coronary arteries.
He underwent emergency quadruple bypass surgery to repair a 1970 bypass and new damage to the heart.
After surgery, Robbins was able to smile and squeeze a nurse's hand, prompting doctors to give him a 50-50 chance for survival but his condition deteriorated rapidly.
'Before he would submit to the first bypass surgery, Marty made us promise that he could still race,' said Dr. Williams Ewers, referring to Robbins' second love, race car driving.
Robbins competed in the Daytona 500 and finished in the top 10 in several NASCAR races, but never won.
In one race, in 1972, at Daytona, Robbins crashed his car at a speed near 150 mph but miraculously escaped injury.
Robbins was the first country-western singer ever to receive a Grammy. One of his 500 compositions, a 1959 classic ballad called 'El Paso' about a cowboy who died in a barroom shootout, earned him the Grammy and superstar status in country music.
Robbins preferred sad songs. His haunting country vocals recorded with a smooth, story-book style often brought tears to the eyes of his fans.
Some of his more popular songs included 'White Sport Coat and a Pink Carnation,' 'Up to My Shoulders in a Headache,' and the crossover hit 'Pretend.'
Robbins dropped out of high school in Glendale, Ariz., and learned to play the guitar during a hitch in the Navy. He began entertaining in the late 1940s and gained national prominence in the early 1950s with 'Singin' the Blues.'
Before turning to music as a full-time profession, Robbins was an amateur boxer, dug ditches, drove trucks, delivered ice and served as a mechanic's helper.
