Howard Wales and Jerry Garcia (HWJG) is another one of these things about which I have a great deal to say, but no time to get it down except in dribs and drabs. So be it.
Quick question or two on the January 1972 east coast tour they did, Jerry’s first non-GD-related paying gigs in the northeast, AFAIK.
First, slipnut over at The Jerry Site just posted two new gigs, based on credible-looking information at the Mahavishnu Orchestra set lists site. I believe that MO was also on Douglas Records and that MO was opening for HWJG at a number of the shows on the tour. The newly-considered are as follows:
- Friday, January 28, 1972: Palace Theatre, Providence, RI
- Saturday, January 29, 1972: University of Buffalo, Buffalo, NY
These gigs seem really plausible. Obviously the Friday-Saturday would be good nights to book. The venues also seem plausible: up to Providence from Boston on 1/26, and another college gig after the Villanova show on Sunday 1/23. Probably medium-sized rooms, probably just about right.
Still, it’s surprising that these shows have never come to light (that I know of – prepared to be corrected, of course). East coast stuff tends to be documented pretty well.
(BTW, the MO site also lists a gig on 1/22 at Union College in Schenectady, NY, but doesn’t indicate it was opening for HWJG … I wouldn’t be at all surprised if it was, though …) update: nope, HWJG in Syracuse on 1/22.
Lots more to say, but I’ll just ask a second question –or pose a lament– re: tapes.
The only circulating tape is January 26, 1972 from the Boston Symphony Hall, which was broadcast on WBCN. Tapes also masquerade under the date of 1/25, but they are from 1/26. There is nothing else in circulation from this tour. Indeed, the only other live HWJG in circulation is from the incredible, breathtaking, begging-for-a-volume-two Side Trips, Vol. 1 (Grateful Dead Records, GDCD 4061, October 1998), which I believe to have been recorded on 5/18/70 at the Matrix. Ken Lee, the usher whose masterful, spread balcony recordings from the Capitol Theater in Port Chester, NY are rightfully legendary, seems to have taped at least one of the shows from the Academy of Music in New York, NY on January 21 (early | late); alas, the Port Chester Resurrection Project, which brought a handful of these (apparently massively numerous) tapes into clear light (some for the first time), has been stalled for several years at least. Please, please, if you know the folks involved, kindly, gently, respectfully ask them if they might be able to preserve those precious historical documents!
I have also long wondered about the Villanova show on 1/23. From the ad below, we see that it was sponsored by WKVU Villanova … surely there was a broadcast to go alongside? And if so, didn’t anyone tape it? Anyone want to check Villanova, starting with the station itself?
update: related, it seems that 1/29/72 in Buffalo was FM broadcast!
All right, enough hectoring. Really just wanted to see if anyone remembers these or other Wales/Garcia gigs in January, 1972!
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