Category: Merl Saunders
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San Francisco Sessions, 1969
update: changed title 20160319 San Francisco Sessions Series San Francisco Sessions, 1967-1968 San Francisco Sessions, 1969 San Francisco Sessions, 1970 San Francisco Sessions, 1971 San Francisco Sessions, 1972 Moving through the Garciaverse, I pick up lots of pieces that are more degrees of separation out from Jerry than I can ever have real occasion to…
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Cats in the Studio: September 1977
–> I can’t write up everything I have gathered around the recording of Garcia’s 1978 masterpiece Cats Under the Stars, not now, and, alas, perhaps not ever in any true sense of the word “everything”. Once I write the book I plan on just throwing open all of my materials and letting others have at…
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Sole Star at Paul’s Mall
For the JGMS gigs November 12-13-14, 1974, Paul’s Mall in Boston, two shows a night booked by one Fred Taylor. MERL SAUNDERS AND JERRY GARCIA CONTRACT RIDER 3. MERL SAUNDERS & JERRY GARCIA shall receive 100% sole star billing in any and all advertising and publicity, including marquee … Does this mean that things should…
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Carl Lockett and the Side Trips Social Network
Preface: Reconstruction #2 Jerry Garcia’s commitment to Reconstruction never seemed total, a big problem if you’re John Kahn, first, and then Merl Saunders, looking to reboot the lucrative Garcia-Saunders-Kahn Fantasy Records franchise. It’s no good if the G is wobbly, because “multiracial dance and jazz band with a rotating cast of Bay Area guitarists, including…
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JGB: Halloween 1981 – LN jg1981-10-31.jgb.early-late.aud-levene.88958.flac1644
Late Jerry loved playing on Halloween. In the last fifteen years of his life, the only years he is not known to have gigged on Halloween are 1982 and 1994. Table xxx. Garcia on Halloween, 1980-1994. Orange is GD, blue is GOTS. As indicated in the table, things were distributed across the GD (6 dates/shows)…
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Latest Legion Listing
Funny the things that pop up. Here’s a listing from the Marin Independent-Journal of July 25, 1975 for Legion of Mary at the Great American Music Hall on Wednesday, July 30, 1975. Of course, the last known Legion gig having been on July 6th, this listing caught my eye. What does it mean? I don’t…
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Jerry’s January 1976
(formatting will almost certainly be a mess – I blame Blogger) I. Preface My band is in a state of flux right now. John Kahn and Ron Tutt and I are the main … are the nucleus of it, such as it is. We’re hoping to have a four-piece band that we all like, sometime.…
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Risky Reconstruction
**massively updated 11/24/2014 11 PM mountain time** I just tipped my hat to the idea of meso level musical risk in Garcia’s side trips. This is the pedantic-even-by-my-high-standards phrasing of the notion that that different bands, qua bands (combinations of players and repertoires), could and did musically challenge Garcia to different degrees. The challenge-comfort continuum…
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Risk and Challenge in the 1970s
Here’s a back-of-the-napkin sketch, my subjective assessment, of the musical risks and challenges associated with Garcia’s 1970s bands (qua personnel and repertoire) playing black and race-fusion music. So, this includes Wales-Garcia, all of the Jerry and Merl outfits, and all of the JGBs. It excludes NRPS, OAITW, GAMB/GASB (playing mostly white roots music), and the…
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Contradictions Are Fun
The human spirit … is the favorite home of contradictions, indeed they do not seem to prosper or even find viable living conditions outside it. José Saramago, All the Names, p. 228 Jerry Garcia and Merl Saunders were advertised to play the Matrix at 3138 Fillmore on Wednesday, March 3, 1971. But as far as…