The First Fusion concert of Grateful Dead songs is set for May 7 at the Marin Center in San Rafael, California. As of late April, tickets remained on sale.
Update: View some rehearsal footage from the First Fusion preparations, as well as some cool photos of Weir and the musicians. /update
The postponed Oct. 22, 2010, concert by Weir and the orchestra would have brought Grateful Dead classics to the other long-hair music. It was “reluctantly” postponed because of poor ticket sales.
Weir continues to work on the psychedelic-symphonic Dead arrangements with Italian composer and arranger Giancarlo Aquilanti of Stanford. In addition to the Marin Symphony Orchestra players, Weir will be joined by some frequent collaborators.
Originally, the plan was for a two-part evening. First the entire symphony was to dress up a handful of Dead classics. After that, Weir and Quartet San Francisco (backed by some symphony players) were to perform music that was “improvised, imaginative, impassioned.”
“This is completely different,” Weir says of the new show. “For one thing, part of what makes this interesting is that’s not just going to be an orchestra playing Grateful Dead songs. I’m going to be playing too, along with Jeff Chimenti, Jay Lane, Robin Sylvester, Rob Wasserman and some other guys, and there’s going to be real interaction between the symphony and us.”
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