SAN RAFAEL, Calif., Aug. 9 -- Jerry Garcia, the bearded lead guitarist of San Francisco's legendary rock band the Grateful Dead and patriarch of legion of fans known as Deadheads, died Wednesday of apparent natural causes. He was 53. The Marin County Sheriff's Department said Garcia was found dead at 4:23 a.m. by a counselor in his room at Serenity Knolls, a residential drug treatment center. Garcia entered the center in rustic Forest Knolls sometime after his band's most recent concert on July 9. A nurse attempted to resuscitate him, as did paramedics, but he did not respond. 'It appears Mr. Garcia died of natural causes,' the sheriff's statement said. The Marin County Coroner's Office was investigating. Garcia's spokesman, Dennis McNally, called Garcia's death 'a meltdown' and later attributed it to a heart attack. McNally said he and Garcia's bandmates were unaware he had checked into the treatment center. 'I thought he was going to Hawaii and just cool out,' McNally said. 'He had checked in without anyone's knowledge. It couldn't have been more than a day or two ago.' Bob Weir, the Dead's rhythm guitarist, was in New Hampshire with his own band when he learned of Garcia's death. 'It's a big loss for the world, for anyone who loves music,' Weir told CBS Radio. 'His life was far more a blessing for all of us. We should dwell on that.' Jerome John Garcia, born Aug. 1, 1942, was a founder and the best known member of the Grateful Dead, formed in his native San Francisco in 1965 and known for a repertoire that covered psychedelic rock, folk rock and even a bluegrass country sound.
The band's best-known songs include 'Truckin'' in 1971 and 'Touch of Grey,' which reached No. 9 on the charts in 1987. Three decades after their start, the Grateful Dead remained one of the top-drawing concert acts in the music business. It was the fifth-highest grossing touring act in 1994, taking in $52. 4 million in that record-breaking year for the North American concert industry, according to Dion Watts of the concert industry trade paper Pollstar. The band played its last show with Garcia July 9 at Chicago's Soldier Field, was set to perform Sept. 13 in Boston and to wrap up this latest tour Oct. 22 in Mountain View, Calif. Gregg Perloff, president of promotion firm Bill Graham Productions Inc., said the Grateful Dead made his company what it is. 'They were the only band that allowed us to experiment with special effects, with how to put on concerts outdoors,' Perloff said. 'Once you heard just one note of a Grateful Dead song, you knew it was Jerry. Nobody, nobody played like Jerry.' Fellow guitarist Carlos Santana, a longtime friend, was said to be shocked and visibly upset by the news. Santana called Garcia 'a profound talent' and said he was confident his friend had taken his rightful place beside 'Bill Graham, Jimi Hendrix, Marvin Gaye, Miles Davis and other greats who have left us much too soon.' The Dead enjoyed a far greater success in concerts, with all the potential mishaps of live performance, than they did in recordings made under precise studio controls, yet Garcia once said the secret to making the music sound its best was good engineering. 'The mix is my understanding about how Grateful Dead music works,' he told United Press International in 1987. 'A lot of producers we've worked with don't understand how Grateful Dead music works. There's a real structure to it, and there's real conversation, like in a string quartet, to it. 'The instruments speak to each other. Unless you mix it so that's intelligible, then it's nonsense. That's something I can't communicate to a producer, but I can hear it.' Garcia recorded several albums under his own name and with other ensembles such as the Jerry Garcia Band and the Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band. But much of that work didn't stray too far from the sounds of the Grateful Dead. In addition to his music, Garcia found a creative outlet in painting, designing a line of silk ties that bear his name. His health troubles were not limited to his drug use, which included a longtime heroin addiction that he acknowledged publicly. On July 10, 1986, he collapsed at his Marin County home and lapsed into a diabetic coma. He was hospitalized for three weeks and was released on his 44th birthday. At that time, the Grateful Dead reported its hotline received 65,000 telephone calls from fans seeking word on Garcia's condition. 'Jerry was not the most disciplined fellow,' McNally said Wednesday. 'As a result, the diet he was supposed to follow wasn't adhered to. He exercised, but he still smoked a little and really didn't take the best care of himself. 'All indications were that he was making a real effort to get in good shape. That's the irony of all this. He had made the commitment,' McNally said. 'But I guess his heart just gave out. He had a heart attack.' Asked why Garcia and the Dead endured when so many other bands faded away, McNally said, 'Well, he was a wonderful musician. He was not into his own ego, he was dedicated to his music and loved to play with others. His music was a collaboration. 'He was a charismatic person, but one who refused to make decision. So as a result he was not a leader like a Mick Jagger; he led by example,' McNally said. 'Whenever you think of the warmth and compassion of the Deadheads, it derived from Jerry. We've all got large holes in our hearts right now.' McNally was unable to say what will become of the band without Garcia. 'That's not my decision,' he said. 'Whatever happens, it will not be the Grateful Dead that we all know and love.'
The Dead enjoyed a far greater success in concerts, with all the potential mishaps of live performance, than they did in recordings made under precise studio controls, yet Garcia once said the secret to making the music sound its best was good engineering. 'The mix is my understanding about how Grateful Dead music works,' he told United Press International in 1987. 'A lot of producers we've worked with don't understand how Grateful Dead music works. There's a real structure to it, and there's real conversation, like in a string quartet, to it. 'The instruments speak to each other. Unless you mix it so that's intelligible, then it's nonsense. That's something I can't communicate to a producer, but I can hear it.' Garcia recorded several albums under his own name and with other ensembles such as the Jerry Garcia Band and the Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band. But much of that work didn't stray too far from the sounds of the Grateful Dead. In addition to his music, Garcia found a creative outlet in painting, designing a line of silk ties that bear his name. His health troubles were not limited to his drug use, which included a longtime heroin addiction that he acknowledged publicly. On July 10, 1986, he collapsed at his Marin County home and lapsed into a diabetic coma. He was hospitalized for three weeks and was released on his 44th birthday. At that time, the Grateful Dead reported its hotline received 65,000 telephone calls from fans seeking word on Garcia's condition. 'Jerry was not the most disciplined fellow,' McNally said Wednesday. 'As a result, the diet he was supposed to follow wasn't adhered to. He exercised, but he still smoked a little and really didn't take the best care of himself. 'All indications were that he was making a real effort to get in good shape. That's the irony of all this. He had made the commitment,' McNally said. 'But I guess his heart just gave out. He had a heart attack.' Asked why Garcia and the Dead endured when so many other bands faded away, McNally said, 'Well, he was a wonderful musician. He was not into his own ego, he was dedicated to his music and loved to play with others. His music was a collaboration. 'He was a charismatic person, but one who refused to make decision. So as a result he was not a leader like a Mick Jagger; he led by example,' McNally said. 'Whenever you think of the warmth and compassion of the Deadheads, it derived from Jerry. We've all got large holes in our hearts right now.' McNally was unable to say what will become of the band without Garcia. 'That's not my decision,' he said. 'Whatever happens, it will not be the Grateful Dead that we all know and love.'
