Squaw Valley ’91: Bela Fleck With Jerry Garcia & David Grisman

Just two months before his tragic death concert promoter Bill Graham’s Bill Graham Presents outfit teamed up with the Squaw Valley Ski Corporation to throw a two-day festival at Gold Coast Concert Bowl in Squaw Valley, California on August 24 and 25, 1991 called the Squaw Valley Summer Music Festival. Among the acts on the impressive bill were the Jerry Garcia Band, Bela Fleck and the Flecktones, David Grisman, Tower of Power, Booker T. and the MGs, The Neville Brothers and Jimmy Cliff. Garcia performed with the JGB on the 24th and with David Grisman on the 25th.

The Garcia & Grisman set started at the extremely early time of 1PM and the pair’s band featured Jim Kerwin on bass and Joe Craven on violin and percussion. For the encore, the quartet was joined by Bela Fleck on banjo for Grisman’s Eat My Dust along with the Grateful Dead classic Ripple. Today, a video containing nearly 80 minutes of footage shot by a fan of some of the first set, the entire second set and the encore surfaced on YouTube thanks to VoodooNola2. Come for the amazing Fleck jams with Jerry and Grisman during the encore, but stay for the entire wonderful performance.

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PJl-zvWLitY[/youtube]

Garcia & Grisman – August 25, 1991

Partial Set 1: Friend Of The Devil, Two Soldiers, So What?

Set 2: Russian Lullaby, Dawg’s Waltz, Thrill Is Gone, Old Rocking Chair, Arabia,

Encore: Eat My Dust, Ripple – w/ Bela Fleck on banjo

[Setlist via The Jerry Site]

As an added bonus, we’ve shared audio of Bela Fleck performing Harder They Come with the Jerry Garcia Band at the Greek Theatre in Berkeley, California on August 5, 1990…

[Audio of Entire Show on bt.etree.org]