Alice Kahn Fall 1984 interview annotations

These are for my purposes, no pretense to completeness.

I find his comments about Joe Garcia to be quite revealing. There are a few other good nuggets in here. Man, even in the depths of his Rock Bottom period, he sounds engaged and articulate. What a mind!

~~~~~~~~~~~

Reading Notes: Henke 1991

LIA posted a quote from this, I stumbled across it amidst my materials, and I decided now was as good a time as any to annotate it.

Henke, James. 1991. The Rolling Stone Interview: Jerry Garcia. Rolling Stone, October 31, 34-40, 103, 106, 108.

Two September 1991 afternoons, hotel room overlooking Central Park.

July 1991 was release of JG DG, August 1991 was release of double live JGB. Meantime, JG was trying to kick H again.

“solo jaunts are often more entertaining than his work with the Dead, and one gets the feeling that if he felt he could easily extricate himself from the Dead and his attendant responsibilities, he might just do it. Still, when pressed, Garcia claimed the Dead take precedence. … We’ve all put so much of our lives into it by now that it’s too late to do anything drastic” (Henke 1991, 37).

Two separate interview sessions September 1991 NYC. In a family way with Manasha and Keelin.

“recent” meeting in which Garcia told the other band members that he wasn’t having fun anymore, that he wasn’t enjoying playing with the Dead. Garcia confirms this.

“The band is the board of directors, and we have regular meetings with our lawyers and our accountants. And we’ve got it done to where it only takes about three or four hours, about every three weeks. But anyway, the last couple of times, I’ve been there screaming ‘Hey, you guys!’ Because there are times when you go onstage and it’s just plain hard to do, and you start to wonder, ‘Well, why the fuck are we doing this if it’s so hard?’”

“We’ve been running on inertia for quite a long time. I mean, insofar as we have a huge overhead, and we have a lot of people that we’re responsible for, who work for us and so forth, we’re reluctant to do anything [38] to disturb that. We don’t want to take people’s livelihoods away. But it’s us out there, you know. And in order to keep doing it, it has to be fun” (Henke 1991, 37-38).

“we’re … going to have to construct new enthusiasm for ourselves, because we’re getting a little burned out. We’re a little crisp around the edges” (Henke 1991, 38).

They are trying to work up to taking a long break, a la 1974, “aiming for six months off the road” (Henke 1991, 38).

p. 38 Gar talks about how he dislikes trying to write songs. “It’s like pulling teeth.”

They saw Brent’s death coming. “About six or eight months earlier, he OD’d and had to go to the hospital, and they just saved his ass. … I think there was a situation coming up where he was going to have to go to jail. He was going to have to spend like three weeks in jail, for driving under the influence or one of those things, and it’s like he was willing to die just to avoid that. Brent was not a real happy person. And he wasn’t like a total drug person. He was the kind of guy that went out [39] occasionally and binged. And that’s probably what killed him” (Henke 1991, 38-39).

Getting older, people dying. Rick Griffin just died. “[F]or me at this point, I’m just happy if someone dies with a minimum of pain and horror” (Henke 1991, 39).

“I’m not a religious person” (Henke 1991, 39).

“The Grateful Dead is not where you’re going to find comfort. In fact, if anything, you’ll catch a lot of shit. And if you don’t get it from the band, you’ll get it from the roadies. They’re merciless. They’ll just gnaw you like a dog. They’ll tear your flesh off. They can be extremely painful” (Henke 1991, 39). Note that one word from Garcia could have put a stop to that, but he didn’t roll that way.

“Brent had a deeply self-destructive [40] streak.” (Henke 1991, 39-40). Talks about Brent lacking in culture.

“My life would be miserable if I didn’t have those little chunks of Dylan Thomas and T.S. Eliot” (Henke 1991, 40).

#drugs “I’ve been round and round with the drug thing. People are always wanting me to take a stand on drugs, and I can’t. To me, it’s so relativistic, and it’s also very personal. A person’s relationship to drugs is like their relationship to sex. … For me, in my life, all kinds of drugs have been useful to me, and they have also definitely been a hindrance to me. So, as far as I’m concerned, the results are not in. Psychedelics showed me a whole other universe, hundreds and millions of universes. So that was an incredibly positive experience” (Henke 1991, 40).

Still dabble with mushrooms: “It’s one of those things where every once in a while you want to blow out the pipes. For me, I just like to know they’re available, just because I don’t think there’s anything else in life apart from a near-death experience that shows you how extensive the mind is” (Henke 1991, 40).

“as far as the drugs that are dead-enders, like cocaine and heroin and so forth, if you could figure out how to do them without being strung out on them, or without having them completely dominate your personality … I mean, if drugs are making your decisions for you, they’re no fucking good. I can say that unequivocally. If you’re far enough into whatever your drug of choice is, then you are a slave to the drug, and the drug isn’t doing you any good” (Henke 1991, 40).

“I’m an addictive-personality kind of person. … with drugs, the danger is that they run you. Your soul isn’t your own. That’s the drug problem on a personal level” (Henke 1991, 40).

Says he was doing H on and off for 8 years.

Hard to quit H, but real problem now is smokes, that last thing left. “My friends won’t let me take drugs anymore, and I don’t want to scare people anymore. Plus, I definitely have no interest in being an addict” (Henke 1991, 40).

“I still have that desire to change my consciousness, and in the last four years I’ve gotten real seriously into scuba diving.” Also gives him some physical exertion (Henke 1991, 40).

With Keelin “I have a little more time to actually be a father. My other daughters have all been very good to me, insofar as they've never blamed me for my absentee parenting. And it was tough for them, really, because during the sixties and seventies, I was gone all the time. But they've all grown up to be pretty decent people, and they still like me. We still talk. But I never did get to spend a lot of time with them." (Henke 1991, 40).

Garcia got together with Heather (daughter of Jerry and Sara Katz) for first time 18 or 19 years ... (Henke 1991, 103).

At this point, JG and MG are in the process of getting divorced. “She’s real glad to get rid of me. We had a great time, a nice life together, but we went past it. … We haven’t really lived together since the 70s” (Henke 1991, 103).

Joe died when Gar was 5. Joe played clarinet and other woodwinds, in a big ol 40 piece jazz orchestra. “My father’s sister says he was in a movie, some early talkie.” (Henke 1991, 103).

“I remember him playing me to sleep at night. I just barely remember the sound of it” (Henke 1991, 103).

Jerry watched Joe go under and drown. “It was horrible. I was just a little kid, and I didn’t really understand what was going on, but then, of course, my life changed. “ (Henke 1991, 103).

Ruth was an RN, but after Joe died she took over his bar. “He had this little bar right next door to the Sailor’s Union of the Pacific, the merchant marine’s union, right at First and Harrison, in San Francisco. It was a daytime bar, a working guy’s bar, so I grew up with all these guys who were sailors. They went out and sailed to the Far East and the Persian Gulf, the Philippines and all that, and they would come and hang out in the bar all day long and talk to me when I was a kid. It was great fun for me. I mean, that’s my background. I grew up in a bar. And that was back in the days when the Orient was still the Orient, and it hadn’t been completely Americanized yet. They’d bring back all these weird things. Like one guy had the world’s largest collection of [106] photographs of square riggers” (Henke 1991, 103, 106).

His third grade teacher Miss Simon hipped him to the possibility of being a creative type. “’You mean you can spend all day painting pictures? Wow! What a great piece of news’.” (Henke 1991, 106).

Dwight Johnson was another teacher, “he’s the guy that turned me into a freak” (Henke 1991, 106). He was a motor cycle guy, 7th grade teacher.

Talks about liking Dylan songs: “they speak to me emotionally on some level. Sometimes, I don’t even know why. Like that song, Senor. There’s something creepy about that song, but it’s very satisfying in a weird sort of way” (Henke 1991, 106). “This is talking about a kind of desperation that everybody experiences” (Henke 1991, 108). Songs-S

More fun outside the Dead. “that’s always dangling in front of me, the thing of, well, shit, if I was on my own, God, I could … “ (Henke 1991, 108).

“Bruce, Branford, Rob Wasserman and I have talked about putting something together. I had this notion of putting together a band that had no material, that just got onstage and blew. And maybe one of these days we’ll make that happen” (Henke 1991, 108).

Garcia listens to Django, Art Tatum, Charlie Parker, Coltrane. “Michael Hedges is great. And my personal favorite lately is this guy Frank Gambale, who’s been playing with Chick Corea for the past couple of years” (Henke 1991, 108).

“Living Colour is a great band … Jane’s Addiction is another band I like” (Henke 1991, 108).

“I feel like I’m a hundred million years old” (Henke 1991, 108).

Why kids keep coming to see the Dead: “There must be a dearth of fun out there in America. Or adventure. Maybe that’s it, maybe we’re just one of the last adventures in America” (Henke 1991, 108).

"A Shitty Father"

The title of this post comes from Garcia daughter Annabelle's remarks at his funeral on 8/11/95, probably not said in anger, almost certainly considerably true.

I don't recall Jerry speaking so frankly about this issue as here, ca. July 1981: 

I have a family – I am talking about the woman I used to live with, and my kids—and I visit them. They certainly mean something to me, but they are not the focus of my life, and they know it. It’s been hard for me to come to grips with some of this, because these are people that I care about … Music is my life. There's nothing I love more than music. 

Van Matre, Lynn. 1981. Jerry Garcia Keeps the Spirit of the Grateful Dead Alive. Chicago Tribune, July 5, p. D11.

p.s. in looking up Annabelle's remarks, I have found three versions quoted:

• "he was a shitty father, but a great man" (McNally 2002, 614)
• "a great American but a shitty father" (Gans 2010, 331 )
• "he may have been a genius, but he was a shitty father" (Edmondson 2009, 100)

Elves, Gnomes, Leprechauns and Little People’s Chowder and Marching Society Volunteer Fire Brigade and Ladies Auxiliary String Band

I cannot make any representation for the accuracy of any of this. It's a fascinating piece, of course. Dister was a famous French rock journalist (wiki) who spent ca. 1966-early 1968 in San Francisco, apparently spending a ton of time with the Dead, if the narratives are to be believed. I am sure it is perfectly well based in actual events. My sense is that he's more accurate on the early days (which I focus on here), when he was around, than later stuff, which he gleaned secondarily and in which I have found lots of mistakes on the particulars. Read it like you read Rock Scully's book (1996).

There are some new-to-me band names and such that are more up LIA's alley than mine. There are pre-GD bands and lots of little vignettes. It's a loose participant observation study. Fascinating.

This is an entry in the Reading Notes series, in which I just leave quotes and little annotations of stuff I have read. I make no representation of completeness, it's just whatever catches my eye. Aren't stochastics fun?!? As Ishmael said:

I promise nothing complete; because any human thing supposed to be complete, must for that very reason infallibly be faulty.

Reading Notes:

Dister, Alain. 2007. Grateful Dead: Une légende californienne. Paris: Le Castor Astral. ISBN 9782859207298, 254 pp.

Dister 2007, 22: Jerry’s “beau-père” was Wally Matusiewicz ... was that Ruth’s husband? Says he taught Jerry the rudiments of the guitar, don’t remember that elsewhere. “Wally was not a drinker, but he didn’t disdain the good Lord’s herb, which he considered less dangerous than alcohol.” #family, #Wally Matusiewicz, #Ruth Garcia

Dister 2007, 22: his teacher at the California School of Fine Arts was named Wally Hedrick, who was close to the Beat poets. (?), #Wally Hedrick, #Beats

Dister 2007, 24: after taking a joyride, he was offered a choice between prison and the Army. #Army

Dister 2007, 24: his Army drill sergeant “initiated him in the delicate art of finger picking on an acoustic guitar”. “Certain of his comrades were part of the Kingston Trio” (?) #acoustic, #folk

Dister 2007, 24: before the joyride and the military, Jerry “briefly took part in a jazzy group, The Chords, in the little Northern California town where his mother placed him” #pre-GD

Dister 2007, p. 27: Robert Burns, dit Hunter, born June 23, 1941 in San Luis Obispo. #Robert Hunter

Dister 2007 p. 36: “One can get nothing from the banjo if one does not have an innate taste for a job well done” ... JG as workaholic. “The rest, love, family, hanging out with friends, and the corresponding substances, those were always a sacré foutoir, the uncontrollable part of his existence” ... suggests that music was the one thing Jerry could really exercise some control over. #workaholism, #drugs

Dister 2007, p. 44: ca. 1963, while married to Sara and working at Morgan’s, in a band as follows. Garcia on banjo. Hunter on guitar. NB NRPS parallel: “Hunter was the first victim [of Garcia’s expectation of virtuosity]: he was thanked and thrown out of the group ... An enthusiastic player but with little talent, he gave way to Eric Thompson.” Also Pigpen, Kreutzmann. Name of the band? “Elves, Gnomes, Leprechauns and Little People’s Chowder and Marching Society Volunteer Fire Brigade and Ladies Auxiliary String Band” ... became Black Mountain Boys. #pre-GD, #Eric Thompson, #Bill Kreutzmann, #Pigpen

Dister 2007, 44: autumn 1963, Garcia and Hunter are in the Badwater Valley Boys and meet Bill Monroe at the Ash Grove in Los Angeles. Implies that this was before 11/22/63, JFK assassination. #bluegrass, #Ash Grove

Dister 2007, 44: Mother McCree’s Uptown Jug Champions gig played the Tangent on 1/25/64. #pre-GD

Dister 2007, p. 61: after Frenchy’s, they spent three nights in a row at a Broadway strip joint, Pierre’s, autumn 1965. #pre-GD

Dister 2007, 66: had to change from Warlocks because there were bands by this name in England, Florida, Texas (including future members of ZZ TOP) and a NY-based quartet comprising Lou Reed, John Cale, Sterling Morrison and Mo Tucker, the future Velvet Underground. #pre-GD

Dister 2007, 74: GD in LA from February-May 1966 #GD

Dister 2007, p. 78: Olompali ca. June 1966. #Olompali

Dister 2007, 90: “Jamming together, or sitting in with each other’s bands, is what fundamentally distinguished San Francisco’s music scene from LA’s.” #collective improvisation

Dister 2007, p. 91: Bay Area rockers grew out of the folk scene, especially in Berkeley and Palo Alto. “Ces habitués des hootenannies sont également rompus à l’exercise de la jam-session” #collective improvisation, i.e., #jam

JGMF: The hoot and the open jam session spontaneously evolved in many different contexts. Multiple discovery is common in science (wiki), biologists see tons of convergent evolution (wiki), and even some anthropologists talk about cultural universals (Brown 1991). Anything that has this quality of coming up again and again in the human condition is, in brief, probably really important. And playing music together is one of these kinds of things, really down to the root of our natures. I am talking shelter, warmth, maybe some food and drink, some good old goddamned human company. Get a room for the sex if you can, but the drugs and rock 'n roll are never far from the fire, and that's true for white folks in Appalachia and black folks in the Mississippi delta. Beat a drum, pluck a string, sing a little. In the American context, hollers, Gospels-spirituals, blues, jazz, soul, R&B, funk, and any other "black music" you can think of, whether South, North, Midwest, Great Migration, or wherever, has its improvisational tradition, and this is no less true of your old-timey, folk, Gospels-spirituals, bluegrass, country, rockabilly, rock or heavy metal. It's a people thing, painted in the riotous colors of every other kind of earthly variation.

Dister 2007, p. 103: GD were evicted from Olompali and refuged at Camp Lagunitas in ca. August 1966. Moved to 710 Ashbury in September 1966. #Olompali, #Camp Lagunitas, #houses

Dister 2007, 126-127: story of stealing the equipment from Monterey Pop. P. 127 equipment (le matos) “duly returned eight days later [6/26/67], after having been put to use during a free concert in the Panhandle, a concert in which both Eric Burdon and Jimi Hendrix participated (but where are the tapes?)”

JGMF: I list 6/21/67 at the Polo Grounds (no source, not in Deadlists) and 6/24 at El Camino Park in Palo Alto (http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2009/07/june-24-1967-el-camino-park-palo-alto.html, last consulted 3/28/2011), but nothing from the Panhandle.

Dister 2007, 134: the 10/2/67 bust and subsequent police harassment “ended the [MG-JG] dream of living in the middle of the cauldron” of 710 Ashbury, with the baby and all that, living in the attic. “They would first move near the Palace of the Legion of Honor, not far from the Presidio where Jerry did his brief military service. A little later, they’d cross the Golden Gate Bridge for Larkspur bungalow rented out by John Cipollina’s father.” MG in Greenfield says they lived there six months. #houses

Dister 2007, 141. This is interesting about early GD musical interactions. “Early in November 1967, Pigpen (or maybe Garcia) allows me to accompany him into the recording studio.” Anthem of the Sun ... “The little studio is somewhere downtown. Everyone’s there, squeezed around the console. Garcia’s listening to live tapes, pushing buttons, switching from one solo to another, juggling the mix, barely taking the time to the others what he had in mind. Weir s’emporte, he’s like that, rock ‘n roll energy, shooting nasty looks when he didn’t agree. The exchanges are pretty sharp, one could think that these guys aren’t on the same wavelength, that the group is at risk of imploding at any moment. Several alternative musical conceptions, as many different ways of engaging them ...” #Bob Weir 

JGMF that's a cool little piece of color right there.

Dister 2007, p. 143. Says that TC came into the GD at the time they were working on Anthem ... it comes into the narrative before a discussion of November 1967 ... #Tom Constanten

Dister 2007, 146: first live Dark Star was 12/xx/67.

Dister 2007, 147: Ramrod, first roadie, arrives late December 1967. Rex Jackson came next?

Dister 2007, 150-151. Description of a February 1968 gig at San Quentin. He says “I believe that the day of the concert, or the day before, they found Neal’s body on the side of a railroad track somewhere just outside of San Miguel de Allende, Mexico.” That was February 4, 1968. Later below, he says that “Phil Lesh had stayed in Oregon after a series of concerts in Portland and in the colleges and universities in that neck of the woods. So Bob Weir played bass.” I think he is conflating some stuff here. The correct date, based on contemporary ex post reports (the best kind of data) clearly confirm Thursday, 2/15/68 as the date of this event (UPI 1968; Torgerson 1968; see also Hannan 2009 SQ LLD post).

Contrasts 5/8/69 People's Park with 5/7/69 GGP show. "A distillation of the ending Sixties: a few show in Golden Gate Park, with Bear at the audio console, while ten miles away as the crow flies, tear gas is still sticking to the trees on the Berkeley campus" (Dister 2007, 158). #jerry and the Jeffersons

 

RN Sandy Troy's Captain Trips (1994)

Reading Notes

Troy, Sandy. 1994. Captain Trips: A Biography of Jerry Garcia. New York: Thunder's Mouth Press.

JG devoted to music Troy 1994, xiii

JG was into all kinds of music: folk, bluegrass, country, acid rock, R&B, gospel, jazz. But he never dabbled, he always “plunged in” Troy 1994, xiii

Jose Ramon Garcia emigrated from La Coruna, Spain in 1919 Troy 1994, 1

Ruth Marie Clifford - married 1934  -- 121 Amazon Avenue, San Francisco, in the Excelsior District -- Ca. 1937 Jose’s music career came to an end -- 1937 Jose bought a tavern Four Hundred Club at 400 First Street, corner of Harrison near Bay Bridge (Troy 1994, 2).

8/1/42 JG born at SF Children’s Hospital (Troy 1994, 3)

surrounded by music. Father played clarinet. Mother listened to opera. Maternal grandmother loved country music. Troy 1994, 3

Ruth played piano, JG took piano lessons Troy 1994, 3

87 Harrington Street with grandparents for five years. William and Tillie Troy 1994, 5

Tillie listened to the Grand Ole Opry on Saturday nights. Carter Family, Bill Monroe, Flatt and Scruggs Troy 1994, 6

Ruth marries Wally Matusiewicz 1952. Family moved to Menlo Park, 286 Santa Monica Avenue. Troy 1994, 6:: lived in Menlo Park for three years. Troy 1994, 10

aged 13, move back to SF, attend Denman Junior High School Troy 1994, 10-11

Balboa High School Troy 1994, 11

Turned on to MJ at age 15, with a friend Troy 1994, 11

Attending Saturday classes and summer sessions at the California School of Fine Arts in North Beach (beatniks!) Troy 1994, 11-13

heard and liked Big Bill Broonzy. Troy 1994, 13

JG’s first guitar idol was Chuck Berry Troy 1994, 15

Ca. age 15, moved to Cazadero, attended Analy HS in Sebastopol. Played a gig: piano, two saxes, a bass, and his guitar. Won a contest and got to record a song. Did Bill Doggett’s “Raunchy”. Troy 1994, 15

age 17, enlisted in military. Basic at Fort Ord, then stationed at Fort Winfield Scott in the Presidio. Lasted nine months, discharged 1960. Troy 1994, 16

while at Presidio, met a country guitar player who got him into finger-picking. Troy 1994, 17

“it was not in his nature to have several girlfriends at one time.” ST says this lasted until present. “This is a trait that he seems to have maintained to the present … he has been married three times and has had a number of affairs, but when the relationship has been right, he has stuck with it.” Troy 1994, 25

early girlfriend Charlotte Daigle. Her girlfriend Chris Mann dated Hunter. Troy 1994, 25

Charlotte Daigle: “he really did things on his own terms, the way he wanted to, without a lot of concern about what he should do or what people wanted him to do. He listened to his inner voice.” Troy 1994, 26

February 1961 Paul Speegle death. Studebaker Golden Hawk. Jerry had switched places with Paul just before the accident. P. 27: JG: “That’s where my life began. Before then I was always living at less than capacity. I was idling. That was the slingshot for the rest of my life. It was like a second chance. Then I got serious.” And he got serious about music, giving up art. Troy 1994, 26-27 #1961

“He chose music because he liked the interaction with other people that it provided.” Music had other players and an audience. Later on, Garcia would say that “the symbiotic relationship of band and audience was integral to his musical experience, what made it come alive for him” (Troy 1994, 27).

Marshall Leicester got him back into bluegrass. Introduced him to the New Lost City Ramblers. Troy 1994, 28

NLCR. Early influence on Jerry. Troy 1994, 28 Also influenced by Joan Baez (Troy 1994, 29). Summer 1961 Garcia went to see Joan Baez at Palo Alto HS. Troy 1994, 29: Watching her, Garcia noted that he could play better guitar than her. (Corry: The girlfriend in question is probably Phoebe Graubard. http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/03/december-12-1981-fiesta-hall-san-mateo.html?showComment=1300209441338#c4828597825817592833; this in response to ““A friend of mine, who was Garcia’s girlfriend in 1961, recalls sitting with him in the front row of Joan Baez’s concert at Palo Alto High that summer. He watched Baez intently, saying ‘I can do that! I can beat her technique.’” Kahn, Alice. 1984. Jerry Garcia and the Call of the Weird. West (SJ Mercury News) (December 30), pp. 14-17, 20-22. reprinted in Dodd and Spaulding 2000, pp. 196-203), quote from p. 202 of the reprint. Dodd, David G., and Diana Spaulding. 2000. The Grateful Dead Reader. Oxford: Oxford University Press.) http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/03/december-12-1981-fiesta-hall-san-mateo.html?showComment=1300209154277#c7489269821427829383

summer 1961, Garcia met David Nelson at Kepler’s. Troy 1994, 30

September 1961 JG goes to see Monterey Jazz Festival. NB 9/22-23-24/61. JG went two days with Charlotte Daigle. Troy 1994, 34

summer 1962, Jorma meets him at a place called the Folk Theatre, on First Street in San Jose (became the Offstage). Troy 1994, 38

Hart Valley Drifters Troy 1994, 41

another girlfriend, Diane Huntsberger, classmate of Daigle’s. Then Sara Ruppenthal, also Paly HS. Troy 1994, 46

Heather born 12/8/63. Troy 1994, 48

GD split into two camps: Gar and Lesh more improvisational, Weir and Pigpen on the other side, more structured and song oriented. Troy 1994, 119

“to play the music that he had decided on, Garcia formed the group Mickey Hart and the Hartbeats”. Troy 1994, 120

TC: “Mickey Hart and the Hartbeats was a period of time when Garcia and Lesh were into a more extended improvisation trip, which was exactly what Weir and Pigpen were less into.” Troy 1994, 121

“The Hartbeats was an interesting side trip for Garcia, but it wasn’t enough by itself to hold his attention.” Liked the GD dynamics. “However, the short break opened his eyes to the advantages of playing with other musicians when his schedule would allow it, and in 1969 he began doing more of that. This extracurricular performing allowed Garcia to scratch his musical itches in a way – he could play music he liked that the Dead didn’t ordinarily do, and he could try out new instruments and new techniques.” Troy 1994, 121

TC was brought in as part of the GD’s move toward more experimentation. Troy 1994, 122

LAG strike, 8/1/69. Garcia couldn’t cross the picket line because of his union sympathies, inherited from his grandmother. When asked why he didn’t cross, he told McNally: “My grandmother.” Troy 1994, 126

JG credited CSN with helping the GD’s vocal harmonies. Troy 1994, 133

JG: “I play music because I love music, … and all my life I’ve loved music.” Troy 1994, 135

“one of his joys was simply putting together an impromptu group, finding a willing watering hole, and filling the space with music. He explained ‘I’m a total junkie when it comes to playing. I just have to play. And when we’re off the road I get itchy, and a bar’s just like the perfect opportunity to get loose and play all night.” Troy 1994, 141

“he clearly preferred playing with other musicians in front of an audience. ‘Rather than sit home and practice, scales and stuff, which I do when I’m together enough to do it, I go out and play because playing music is more enjoyable to me than sitting home and playing scales.” Troy 1994, 142

Merl signed with Fantasy Records in 1965. Troy 1994, 143

PERRO as cross-pollination. Troy 1994, 145

“Another reason for Jerry to spend time away from the Grateful Dead was that he could work out his own personal musical dreams that the other members of the band might have stunted.” Togotigi. Troy 1994, 146

JG got $10k advance for the Stinson Beach house, paid by the solo album. Troy 1994, 147

6/30/72 was Fred Herrera’s swan song at Keystone Korner. Troy 1994, 153

9/22/72: “Playing with Saunders meant so much to Garcia that he even flew back from New York in the middle of a GD tour to play a benefit concert with him at BCT on September 22 [1972].” Troy 1994, 153

Rakow’s plan in So What papers approved on 4/19/73. “In April 1973 Grateful Dead Records was set up, co-owned by all the voting members of the organization, with Rakow as president and general manager. A second label, Round Records, owned fifty-fifty by Garcia and Rakow, was set up to [156] handle solo projects” (Troy 1994, 155-156)

OAITW Troy 1994, 158

JG quotes (maybe from splendor in the bluegrass or something) early 1973 re OAITW: “we got together a little over a month ago, started playing, and then decided, ‘Shit, why don’t we play a few bars and see what happens?’ We’re thinking about finding a fiddle player and then doing some of the bluegrass festivals this summer. … That’d be a lot of fun.” NB the “Bluegrass at Grisman’s” thing confirms that this is more or less exactly how it happened! Troy 1994, 158

“In 1972 and 1973, the Garcia and Saunders Band did three albums for Fantasy Records –Heavy Turbulence, Fire Up, and Live at Keystone.” Troy 1994, 159

JG is the one who pushed Merl to sing! Merl: “He also got me singing. We’d come off a tour and he’d say, ‘Man, you gotta help me out singing.’ I didn’t think I could sing, but I figured if Jerry could sing, I could sing. … That’s how I started singing.” Troy 1994, 160

re GD hiatus. JG: “It had turned into a thing that was out of our control, and nobody was really doing it because they liked it. We were doing it because we had to.” NB solo stuff would always more or less be in his control. Troy 1994, 167

airport porter: “Oh my God, what kind of band is this? You’ve got a hippie [Garcia], a black guy [Saunders], a white guy [Kahn], an Indian [Fierro] and a Super Fly [Humphrey, who dressed in sharp flashy colors].” JGMS Mention of Golden Bear shows, October 1974: “sold-out house” Troy 1994, 168

The “Imagine” story, per Merl: Fall 1971, “I was at Fantasy Records that fall with Garcia, Tom Fogerty, John Kahn and Bill Vitt to record my album. This guy at the studio had a promotional copy of the record.” This is consistent with them playing it September 1971. Troy 1994, 169

no details on end of LOM: “in the summer of 1975 the two musicians decided to go their own way.” Troy 1994, 169

Deborah Koons. JG had met her in Cincinnati during a tour (December 1973?). Troy 1994, 170

“The majority of Garcia’s third solo LP, Reflections, was also recorded at Weir’s studio in 1975.” I don’t think so – His Master’s Wheels. Troy 1994, 173

Jerry Garcia Band. Troy 1994, 175

Keith and Donna join JGB. Kahn: “Keith lived over on Paradise Drive [in Corte Madera], and we used to play over there all the time. He had a room downstairs that was set up so we could just go in and play … we’d get together just about every night and [176] play. … We had Dylan songbooks and we’d do stuff like play everything from Blonde on Blonde. Then we’d do all sorts of Beatles songs. It was great.” Troy 1994, 175: 1975,

“Playing with this group [JGB] was like sitting in a favorite old easy chair for Garcia. He claimed, ‘I haven’t been as happy with any little performing group since Old and In the Way in terms of feeling this is really harmonious.” Comfort, JGB as harmonious. Contrast with GD: challenge, dissonance. Troy 1994, 176

late 1978, Jerry’s voice ragged, “a condition exacerbated by the three packs of unfiltered Camels he smoked every day and by his chronic use of central nervous system stimulants.” Troy 1994, 190

Reconstruction “played primarily black music – funk, jazz, soul, blues and reggae. … But Garcia’s desire to have his own band as a creative outlet was strong”, so we got the Ozzie JGB. Troy 1994, 193

Seals “was suggested to Garcia by Kahn, who had met Melvin through Maria Muldaur. A Bay Area native, Seals had spent much of his life involved with the music of the black Baptist church. … his roots were firmly in gospel music, and he found inspiration in the music of the church. The gospel influence that Seals brought to the Garcia Band was very much to Garcia’s liking” Troy 1994, 199

“Soon after Garcia completed the drug diversion program”, the GD had their 20^th anniversary stuff. Troy 1994, 205

GD played 71 shows, sold out all but six, and grossed $11.5 million in 1985. Troy 1994, 205

Merl says that he was on a beach in the Caribbean, and suffered some kind of heat stroke at precisely the same moment that Jerry was short circuiting (July 10, 1986). Troy 1994, 207-208

more on friends and the coma. David Nelson. Merl: “I started walking with him every day from the house out to the road and back to the house. [211] We started practicing five minutes a day.” Troy 1994, 210

Graham on Garcia wanting to play Broadway: “One month prior [Garcia was] playing five sold-out shows at Madison Square Garden … that’s 100,000 people. For the lead guitarist of that same group to play eighteen shows at a 1,400 seat theater, obviously there’s a desire to do this, not a need to do this. Since the very first day I met him, he has not changed his seemingly unquenchable thirst to just play.” Troy 1994, 223

Blues from the Rainforest began recording March 1989. Troy 1994, 231

Midland “had been fighting a drug problem for more than a year and had been rushed to the hospital when he almost overdosed the prior December [1989].” Troy 1994, 233

Garcia/Grisman earned a Grammy nomination and sold more than 100,000 copies. Troy 1994, 239

JG, ca. 1992: “Ideally I’d have the Dead play two nights a week, play bluegrass two nights a week, and play with my band two nights, and on the other day go to a movie.” That doesn’t seem like too much to ask for! Such simple tastes! Troy 1994, 239

1991, GD grossed $34.7 million. Troy 1994, 245

“for a couple of months in early 1993 Garcia was seeing Barbara Meier … but in the spring he reconnected with Deborah Koons.” Troy 1994, 250.