SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Thousands of people gathered Saturday at the San Francisco Civic Center to celebrate the life of Bob Weir, the legendary guitarist and founding member of the Grateful Dead who died last week at the age of 78.
Musicians Joan Baez and John Mayer spoke on a makeshift stage in front of the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium after four Buddhist monks opened the event with a prayer in Tibetan. Fans carried long-stemmed red roses, placing some on an altar filled with photos and candles. They wrote notes on colored paper, professing their love and thanking him for the trip.
Several asked him to tell fellow singer and guitarist Jerry Garcia and bass guitarist Phil Lesh, also founding members who caught him in death. Garcia died in 1995; Lesh died in 2024.
“I’m here to celebrate Bob Weir,” said Ruthie Garcia, who is no relation to Jerry, a fan since 1989. “We celebrate him and help him go home.”
Saturday’s celebration brought many fans with long dreadlocks and tie-dye outfits, some using walkers. But there were also young couples, men in their 20s and a father who brought his 6-year-old son to pass on to the next generation the love of live music and the tight-knit Deadhead community.
The Bay Area native joined the Grateful Dead – originally the Warlocks – in 1965 in San Francisco at just 17 years old. He wrote or co-wrote and sang lead vocals on Dead classics including “Sugar Magnolia,” “One More Saturday Night” and “Mexicali Blues.” He was generally considered less shaggy looking than the other band members, although he adopted a long beard like Garcia later in life.
The Dead played music that drew on blues, jazz, country, folk and psychedelia in long improvisational jams. Their concerts attracted avid Deadheads who followed them on tours. The band played decades after Garcia’s death, morphing into Dead & Company with John Mayer.
Darla Sagos, who caught an early flight out of Seattle Saturday morning to mourn publicly, said she suspected something was up when no new gigs were announced after Dead & Company played three nights in San Francisco last summer. It was unusual, as his calendar often showed where he would be playing next.
“We were hoping that everything was fine and that we were going to get more music from him,” she said. “But we will continue the music, with all of us and with everyone who will play it.”
Sagos and her husband, Adam Sagos, have a one-year-old grandson who will grow up knowing music.
A statement on Weir’s Instagram account announced his death on January 10. She said he beat the cancer, but succumbed to underlying lung problems. He is survived by his wife and two daughters, who were at the Saturday event.
His death was sudden and unexpected, said daughter Monet Weir, but he always wanted the music and legacy of the Dead to live on.
American music, he believes, can unite, she said.
“The show must go on,” said Monet Weir.