Jerome “Jerry” Garcia: An Appreciation

It all rolls into one/and nothing comes for free/There’s nothing you can hold for very long/And when you hear that song/come crying like the wind/it seems like all this life/was just a dream — “STELLA BLUE”

Jerry Garcia did not seek out fame. A gentle soul who just wanted to play music, fame found him. And despite a long career as an extraordinary guitarist that brought him adulation, gold records and eventually wealth, happiness remained elusive and fame finally killed him.

Don’t get me wrong. Garcia, who was born 65 years ago today, was of course the master of his own destiny. But in addition to being hard wired for musical virtuosity, he slid easily into drug addiction – notably cocaine and later heroin – a refuge from the intense pressures that came with being “Captain Trips,” the de facto leader and spokesman for an improbable success story called the Grateful Dead. He was on and off of the hard stuff for much of his career and mostly on during the years before his weakened heart and diabetes-riddled body packed in at a drug rehab center a few days short of his 54th birthday in 1995.

It may seem off putting that I remember the man Rolling Stone magazine named the 13th all-time greatest rock guitarist for his demons, but I have often reflected on the lives that great musicians live away from the spotlight as what is left of my hair has turned to gray. This helps explain the ambivalence that I and some – if not many – other people with deep musical connections feel for Garcia and for the Dead. To riff on Goldilocks, this is because when they were good they were very, very good. And when they were bad they were horrid.

I say this from some experience: I saw Garcia play over 100 times with the Dead and various side bands. And while I did not know him, we did speak a few times and I know enough people who knew him well that I believe I have his measure.

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