Jerry Garcia and David Bromberg, June 1972

David Bromberg played the Boarding House, 960 Bush Street (San Francisco, CA,94109) June 13-17, 1972.

Robert Dunn wrote a nice review in Night Times. This drew my eye because I recalled that Jerry recorded tracks for Demon in Disguise around this time. Indeed, he did:

Table xxx. Jerry Garcia and David Bromberg: Demon in Disguise sessions, Wally Heider's, June 21-24, 1972.

So I looked at this review to see if maybe there was a hidden Garcia-Bromberg Shared Stage ... but it was not to be. The reviewer never tells us which night he saw, but he does mention that harmonica player Will Scarlett came out and blew some - there's a 1st degree of Shared Stage separation, since Jerry and Scarlett played together any number of times. But it ain't Garcia playing with Bromberg.

Anyway, sound like some good shows, and there are some nice ads on the page, for color.

Where was Garcia on July 26 or 29, 1973?

My previous post contemplated where Garcia was on July 4, 1973, based on ads published in a bluegrass magazine. This post does precisely the same thing for July 26 or 29, 1973.

As you can see, Jerry Garcia is listed among the acts appearing at the First Annual West Virginia Peace, Love, Blues and Bluesgrass [sic] Folk Music Festival (hereafter FAWVPLVVFMF), to be held at Aunt Minnie's Farm and Country Road Park, Rt. No. 33 and 119 (Stumptown) in Glenville, WV on July 26-29, 1973.

Note the pitch to the young/"freak" crowd with the framing, and presumably also through the booking of such acts as the New Riders of the Purple Sage (who would appeal to that sort). There's a lot to say about that, but this is not the place.

Garcia is also billed (as is Vassar Clements) on a handbill held in the Southern Folklife Collection Festival Files (#645) at UNC Chapel Hill.

Did Garcia play this festival, presumably with Old and in the Way?

The 26th and 29th are possible dates, on either end of the GD's performances at Watkins Glen on the 27th and 28th. I'll address them in reverse order.

Re the 29th, Blair Jackson's Garcia ((1), p. 244) says that Jerry appeared in the Burlington County Court (Mount Holly, NJ) on the 29th, in connection with his March 17, 1973 drug bust on the NJ Turnpike (2). But the 29th was a Sunday, and a contemporary article (3) published on the 31st says that he was in court on the 30th. It also says that "Garcia was brought to the hearing … in a helicopter from the Watkins Glen site", which confuses me a little bit unless the GD stayed over at Watkins Glen on the 29th. I doubt they did that, so the record seems a little conflicted. My hunch is that Sunday the 29th would have been an open day for Garcia to play a bluegrass festival, still on the east coast, and indeed that if he had a court date on the 30th it might be a perfect opportunity for him to do so. So I consider the 29th possible.

The 26th also seems possible, though my instinct tells me that it would have been less likely for him to have played a Thursday just prior to Watkins Glen than a Sunday just after it. Not sure why, but there it is.

All of that said, I just don't think this happened, for roughly the same reasons as were adduced against a July 4th festival appearance.First, ads from the next month in Bluegrass Unlimited no longer list Garcia - they show, as did later ads for the 4th, Don Reno and Bill Harrell in that spot. So it seems awfully likely that the Reno-Harrell billing was lined up when Garcia/OAITW dropped out, and this for both July events.

Second, the same eyewitness, who was involved with organizing festivals, doesn't recall Garcia or OAITW at the late July Festival, either. He suggests that these festivals organized by Jim Clark in the summer of 1973 were chaotic and that OAITW may have felt burned after the June 8, 1973 Culpeper-Warrenton Festival. (Yes, I want to know more about that, too. I hope to learn what I can and post.)

As far as I know, there's just no evidence other than some advertisements that this ever happened. And I suspect that the ads promised something that didn't materialize. Getting to the titular question, then: I highly doubt that Garcia was playing a peace, love, blues and bluegrass festival in West Virginia in late July of 1973.

Let me make a macro point about this. The standard histories of OAITW say that they played a couple of east coast dates, and that's it. Like so many of the historical "truths" that surround Garcia, there seems to be more (or even different) to say, at least potentially. Even if they didn't play on July 4th, July 26/29, Labor Day in Camp Springs, or Harpers Ferry on September 7, 1973, that possibility was at least under discussion - so much so that ads were printed in the leading bluegrass magazines. It may not ultimately matter - the most relevant truth may just be that they only played a few of these gigs. But it's also possible that why these gigs were never played --if indeed they weren't-- might be worth knowing as we ponder the too-short history of Old and in the Way.

REFERENCES
(1) Jackson, Blair. 1999. Garcia: An American Life. New York: Penguin Books.
(2) Rolling Stone, 4/26/73, p. 14.
(3) "Bye-Bye, Don’t Come Back," Washington Post, July 31, 1973, p. B2.

Where was Garcia on July 4, 1973?

I don't really know. I have him with the GD at the Universal Ampitheatre in Universal City, CA on June 29 - July 1, and then at the Lion's Share on July 5 with Merl.

July 4 was a Wednesday, but Garcia seemed like a vaguely patriotic guy (in a U.S. Blues sort of way!) who might want to gig on the 4th.

Now consider the following two scans:

According to a May 1973 ad in Bluegrass Unlimited, Old and in the Way and "Jerry Garcia (Grateful Dead)" were listed as scheduled to appear at the 1st Annual Pennsylvania Old Time Mountain-Country Gospel-Bluegrass & Blues Folk Music Arts Festival. I'll call that the 1APOTMCGBBFMAF for short. Based on fliers held in the archives of the Southern Folklife Collection Festival Files at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill (Folder #506), this seems to have been held in Valley View Park, York, PA ("off I-83").

Now, this scan is from the next month's issue of the same magazine. It no longer lists Garcia (Don Reno and Bill Harrell have been subbed in), but it does list Old and in the Way for the 4th. Vassar Clements is also billed for that day (with Doug Dillard), as he had been the month previous.












There are two fliers in the SFC collection, both undated. One lists "Jerry Garcia from Grateful Dead" (underneath "Peter Rowan from Seatrain" -- think they were trying to appeal to the youth/rock audience?). The other does not, and makes no mention of OAITW, either.

Someone who was involved in the bluegrass festival scene at this time says that he doesn't remember seeing Garcia at this 4th of July festival. Combined with the printed materials, this seems to suggest that OAITW/Jerry were originally scheduled to play, or at least discussions were happening, but it didn't come to fruition.

This still leaves open the question of what Jerry was doing on Independence Day 1973, but I do doubt that he attended the 1APOTMCGBBFMAF.

The summer of 1973 bluegrass festival scene certainly warrants a post on its own.