Timeline
The following is a list of all the members of the Grateful Dead. [1] The list does not include members of the various reunion projects.
Over a span of 30 years the Grateful Dead had various combinations of members, as shown in the table. [1]
| Timespan | Members, instruments |
|---|---|
| June 1965 – September 1967 |
|
| September 1967 – November 1968 |
Touring musician
|
| November 1968 – January 1970 |
|
| January 1970 – February 1971 |
|
| February – October 1971 |
|
| October 1971 – March 1972 |
|
| March – June 1972 |
|
| June 1972 – October 1974 |
Touring musician |
| October 1974 – February 1979 |
Touring musician
|
| April 1979 – July 1990 |
|
| September 1990 – August 1995 |
Touring musician
|
The Grateful Dead was an American rock band formed in 1965 in Palo Alto, California. The band is known for its eclectic style, which fused elements of rock, blues, jazz, folk, country, bluegrass, rock and roll, gospel, reggae, and world music with psychedelia; for its differentiated live performances centered around improvisation; and for its devoted fan base, known as "Deadheads". According to the musician and writer Lenny Kaye, "Their music touches on ground that most other groups don't even know exists." For the range of their influences and the structure of their live performances, the Grateful Dead are considered "the pioneering godfathers of the jam band world".
Ronald Charles McKernan, known as Pigpen, was an American musician. He was a founding member of the San Francisco band the Grateful Dead and played in the group from 1965 to 1972.
Philip Chapman Lesh is an American musician and a founding member of the Grateful Dead, with whom he played bass guitar throughout their 30-year career.
Keith Richard Godchaux was an American pianist best known for his tenure in the rock group the Grateful Dead from 1971 to 1979. Following their departure from the Dead, he and his wife Donna formed the Heart of Gold Band in 1980, but Godchaux died from injuries sustained in a car accident shortly after their first concert.
Robert Hall Weir is an American musician and songwriter best known as a founding member of the Grateful Dead. After the group disbanded in 1995, Weir performed with The Other Ones, later known as The Dead, together with other former members of the Grateful Dead. Weir also founded and played in several other bands during and after his career with the Grateful Dead, including Kingfish, the Bob Weir Band, Bobby and the Midnites, Scaring the Children, RatDog, and Furthur, which he co-led with former Grateful Dead bassist Phil Lesh. In 2015, Weir, along with former Grateful Dead members Mickey Hart and Bill Kreutzmann, joined with Grammy-winning singer/guitarist John Mayer, bassist Oteil Burbridge, and keyboardist Jeff Chimenti to form the band Dead & Company. Dead & Company's last performance occurred on 16 July 2023 at Oracle Park in San Francisco.
Grayfolded is a two-CD album produced by John Oswald featuring new edits and re-mixes of the Grateful Dead song "Dark Star". Oswald used a process he calls "plunderphonics" to edit fragments of over a hundred different performances of the song, recorded live between 1968 and 1993, to produce two new versions of the song each lasting about an hour.
Dark Star Orchestra is a Grateful Dead cover band formed in Chicago, Illinois. They serve as a tribute band to the rock group the Grateful Dead. Since 1997, the band has been "celebrating the Grateful Dead concert experience."
The Grateful Dead Movie, released in 1977 and directed by Jerry Garcia, is a film that captures live performances from rock band the Grateful Dead during an October 1974 five-night run at Winterland in San Francisco. These concerts marked the beginning of a hiatus, with the October 20, 1974, show billed as "The Last One". The band would return to touring in 1976. The film features the "Wall of Sound" concert sound system that the Dead used for all of 1974. The movie also portrays the burgeoning Deadhead scene. Two albums have been released in conjunction with the film and the concert run: Steal Your Face and The Grateful Dead Movie Soundtrack.
So Many Roads (1965–1995) is a five-disc box set by the Grateful Dead. Primarily consisting of concert recordings from different periods of the band's history, it also contains several songs recorded in the studio. All but one of the tracks were previously unreleased. The album was released on November 7, 1999. It was certified a gold record by the RIAA on April 12, 2000.
View from the Vault, Volume Two is the second entry in the "View from the Vault" series by the Grateful Dead. It was released simultaneously as a three-disk CD and a one-disk DVD. This volume features the June 14, 1991 concert at Robert F. Kennedy Stadium in Washington, D.C., and bonus material from a show at the same venue on July 12, 1990. It is the only Grateful Dead video release featuring Vince Welnick and Bruce Hornsby.
Dick's Picks Volume 1 is the first album in the Dick's Picks series of live releases by the Grateful Dead. It was recorded on December 19, 1973, at Curtis Hixon Hall in Tampa, Florida, and contains a rare recording of the band playing the blues standard "Nobody's Fault but Mine".
Dick's Picks Volume 12 is the 12th live album in the Dick's Picks series of releases by the Grateful Dead. It was recorded on June 26, 1974, at the Providence Civic Center in Rhode Island and on June 28 at the Boston Garden.
Dick's Picks Volume 17 is the 17th live album in the Dick's Picks series of releases by the Grateful Dead. It was recorded on September 25, 1991 at the Boston Garden in Boston, Massachusetts, with two additional tracks from the March 31, 1991 show at Greensboro.
The Grateful Dead Movie Soundtrack is a five-CD live album by the rock band the Grateful Dead. It was recorded on October 16–20, 1974, and was released on March 15, 2005. The album was remixed from the original 16-track concert soundboard tapes.
The Grateful Dead were an American rock band known for their lengthy, partially improvised performances, as well as for a loyal fan base who often followed the band for several shows or entire tours. They disbanded in 1995, following the death of de facto bandleader Jerry Garcia. Since then remaining members have reunited for a number of concert tours and one-off performances, often in very different configurations. The following is a list of instances where former Grateful Dead members have reunited.
Dave's Picks Volume 2 is a three-CD live album by the band the Grateful Dead. It was recorded on July 31, 1974, at Dillon Stadium in Hartford, Connecticut. It was released on May 1, 2012.
30 Trips Around the Sun is an 80-CD live album, packaged as a box set, by the rock band the Grateful Dead. Announced for the celebration of their 50th anniversary, it consists of 30 complete, previously unreleased concerts, with one show per year from 1966 through 1995. Comprising 73 hours of music, the box set is individually numbered and limited to 6,500 copies. It was released on October 7, 2015.
30 Trips Around the Sun: The Definitive Live Story 1965–1995 is a four-CD live album by the rock band the Grateful Dead. It contains 30 songs recorded in concert—one from each of the years 1966 through 1995—plus one song recorded in a 1965 studio session. All of the tracks are selected from the 80-CD box set 30 Trips Around the Sun, which contains 30 previously unreleased complete shows. The album was released on September 18, 2015. A chronological sampling format was also used for the 5-disc set So Many Roads (1965–1995).
Dave's Picks Volume 17 is a three-CD live album by the rock band the Grateful Dead. It contains the complete concert recorded on July 19, 1974 at Selland Arena in Fresno, California. It was produced in a limited edition of 16,500 numbered copies, and released on February 1, 2016.
Dave's Picks Volume 34 is a three-CD live album by the rock band the Grateful Dead. It contains the complete concert recorded on June 23, 1974, at the Jai-Alai Fronton in Miami, Florida. It also includes a fourth, bonus disc recorded at the same venue the previous night. It was released on May 1, 2020, in a limited edition of 22,000 copies.
