AFM6 San Francisco Sessions Dataset, 1967-1972

Tony Orbasido was running the American Federation of Musicians' Local No. 6 in San Francisco when I started asking him about researching in whatever papers they had. What they had was two 4-drawer filing cabinets stuff with studio recording contracts. I think the union didn't keep gig contracts in hard copy beyond 3-4 years for space reasons, and there were no gig contracts relevant to me.

This was before I could take legible cellphone pictures. I had to run Xerox copies of what I wanted. In later years, I progressively digitized these paper copies. The sample is biased with respect to anything in the Garciaverse, because I was explicitly looking for and only gathering out to Spudfactor = 1 musicians, in addition to Garcia himself. As I have reported, the Jerry Garcia and Grateful Dead contents of these files was dramatically light. I think Tony O said someone had come through and gathered them up. This could well have been the Jerry Garcia Estate, but I do not know that. Anyway, within the limits of the media I was working with, I was able to go through 1967-1972 pretty thoroughly.

I published the Garcia-relevant stuff in batches. By way of making an index, here they are.

San Francisco Sessions, 1967-1968 (August 4, 2015)

San Francisco Sessions, 1969 (August 5, 2015)

San Francisco Sessions, 1970 (August 9, 2015)

San Francisco Sessions, 1971 (July 3, 2016)

San Francisco Sessions, 1972 (November 18, 2017)

Altogether, this is my AFM6 San Francisco Sessions Dataset, 1967-1972

Late '78 Kahn (JGB at Paramount Theatre, Portland, OR, October 26, 1978)

LN jg1978-10-26.jgb.all.aud-severson.148655.flac2496

Not a ton to report. Kahn sounded absolutely amazing on this tour. Really, all through 1978. I don't know if he changed something, if the sound people just dialed him in especially well, or something else, but the bass was big and fat. Great recording by Mark Severson, full of ambience. Garcia strong.

Apparently young Buzzy had let his union membership lapse, because the Portland Musician's Mutual Association, A.F. of M Local number 99 sent a "Dear Sir and Brother" letter, fraternally hoping that notice of Buzzy's delinquency would give everyone "sufficient opportunity to avoid a repetition of this occurrence in any A.F.M. Local's jurisdiction, which could result in files being filed against" ol' Jer.

Jerry Garcia Band

Paramount Theatre

1037 S.W. Broadway

Portland, OR 97205

October 26, 1978 (Thursday)

Severson shnid-148655 flac2496

--set I (7 tracks, 6 tunes, 64:14)--

s1t01. ambience [1:16]

s1t02. Harder They Come [10:53] [1:57]

s1t03. Mission In The Rain [10:11] [0:16] % [0:49]

s1t04. Simple Twist Of Fate [10:38] [2:04]

s1t05. They Love Each Other [7:08] [1:56]

s1t06. It Ain't No Use [7:58] [0:19] % [0:17]

s1t07. Mystery Train [8:18] (1) [0:14]

--set II (7 tracks, 6 tunes, 64:20)--

s2t01. ambience [0:43]

s2t02. Love In The Afternoon [10:26] [1:46]

s2t03. Reuben And Cherise [5:37] [1:33]

s2t04. Tore Up Over You [7:50] [1:33]

s2t05. Gomorrah [5:56] [0:08] %

s2t06. /I'll Be With Thee [#5:09] [1:32]

s2t07. Lonesome And A Long Way From Home [21:45] [0:14] % dead air [0:04]

! ACT1: Jerry Garcia Band #4a

! lineup: Jerry Garcia - el-guitar, vocals;

! lineup: John Kahn - el-bass;

! lineup: Buzz Buchanan - drums;

! lineup: Keith Godchaux - keyboards, harmony vocals;

! lineup: Donna Jean Godchaux - backing vocals;

! lineup: Maria Muldaur - backing vocals.

JGMF:

! Recording: symbols: % = recording discontinuity; / = clipped song; // = cut song; # = truncated timing; {x:xx} = time as tracked on this recording; [x:xx] = recorded even time. The recorded event time immediately after the song or item name is an attempt at getting the "real" time of the event. So, a timing of [x:xx] right after a song title is an attempt to say how long the song really was, as represented on this recording.

! Jerrybase: https://jerrybase.com/events/19781026-03

! db: 

! map: https://goo.gl/maps/BNUjS75ANNs

! JGBP: URL https://jerrygarciasbrokendownpalaces.blogspot.com/2012/08/paramount-theatre-paramount-northwest.html

! ad: Sunday Oregonian, October 8, 1978, p. 16

! ad: Capital-Journal (Salem, OR), October 13, 1978, p. 14-A

! seealso: Nick, "10/24/78: floundering in the snow," URL http://deadthinking.blogspot.com/2017/11/102478-floundering-in-snow.html

! seealso: Corry, "October 26, 1978 Paramount Theater, Portland, OR: Jerry Garcia Band/Bob Weir Band," URL http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/02/october-26-1978-paramount-theater.html. Corry suggests that Garcia found himself increasingly socially isolated in this period, couldn't go out to see other bands gig, and so was scouting talent from bands that opened for the GD or the JGB, noting "Garcia's primary keyboard players from 1979 to 1990 were all in bands that opened for him in 1978".

! historical: Bob Weir Band opened. Western flight #215 from SFO, landing PDX 5:09 PM: R. Taylor, Garcia, Kahn, 2x Godchaux, Muldaur, Buchanan, Healy, Loren, and GUITAR all ticketed. GUITAR doesn't get its own ticket on other flights of the tour until the end.

! R: field recordist: Mark Severson

! R: field recording gear: 2x Sony ECM 270 mics > Sony TC-158

! R: Transfer Info: Master Cassette (Nakamichi CR-7A) > Tascam DA-3000 (DSF 1-bit/5.6 MHz)> dBpoweramp (24/96) > Adobe Audition CC 2019 > TLH flac2496

! R: Notes: - Thanks to Mark Severson for the master cassette recording - Thanks to Charlie Miller for the transfer and coordinating this effort - Thanks to Pat Lee and Matt Smith for the Sony 18n source which supplies the first 5:05 of "Love In The Afternoon" - Thanks to Joe B. Jones for verifying the pitch. Mastered by Scott Clugston December 2019.

! P: s1t02 HTC @ 4:25 KG plays a terrific first lead, while Kahn is rumble-shredding beneath him. This band was so good, and sounded so good, on this tour. Hard to believe they'd only play a couple more shows.

! P: s1t03 MITR @ 3:40 Garcia decides he wants to play loudly, and does so.

! P: s1t04 STOF I have been repeatedly struck by how great Garcia's guitar work is. Late 6 here I especially note it again. Brimming over with stuff to say. No JK solo in this STOF.

! s1t07 (1) JG: "We're gonna take a break for a little while, we'll be back in a few minutes."

! R: s2t06 IBWT clips in

! P: s2t07 LAALWFH JG takes it out right over 6, and it comes back to the tune at 18:15. 12 pretty good, noodly minutes. And then they really stretch out the post-return piece - more than I ever recall in any other version. Donna moaning, Maria harmonizing nicely - lovely!

Kean College Tour Closer: JGB, November 15, 1982 (Late Show)

jg1982-11-15.jgb.late-1.aud-vita-minches.78008.flac1644

Pretty standard late '82 gig to my ears, not the equal to 11/11/82 late or 11/13/82, IMO. Errico's Gatling Gun start to HTC is awesome.

Three little oddities jump out to my pattern-obsessed brain.

First, no early show tape. Hm. Second ... , both the Vita aud and the soundboard tape are missing the encore. Hm. never mind. Third, all of the newspaper listings, some of the tickets, and the band's in-house itinerary show the venue as De'Angelo Gymnasium, but other tickets, the handbill/poster, and at least one recollection (from someone involved in planning the show) place it in the theatre, as the '80 and '83 shows at the college were. Update: it was moved from the gym to the theatre because of concerns for the court surface.

One of these is not like the others.

No biggy, but contradictions are fun.

Jerry Garcia Band

Wilkins Theatre, Kean College

1000 Morris Avenue

Union, NJ 07083

November 15, 1982 (Monday) - Late Show (10 PM)

Vita MAC missing 1 tune shnid-78008

--8 tracks, 7 tunes, missing encore, 74:12)--

l-t01. crowd and tuning [1:23-1:00] 

l-t02. Mission In The Rain [1:00 + 8:53] [0:16] % [0:21]

l-t03. Harder They Come [13:45] [0:11] % [0:12]

l-t04. It Ain't No Use [9:55] [0:02] % [0:03]

l-t05. Mystery Train [8:52] [0:27]

l-t06. Run For The Roses [5:01] [0:33]

l-t07. Dear Prudence [12:44] ->

l-t08. Tangled Up In Blue [11:20] (1) [0:12]

[MISSING: --Encore-- Midnight Moonlight]

! ACT1: Jerry Garcia Band #15b

! lineup: Jerry Garcia - el-g, vocals;

! lineup: John Kahn - el-bass;

! lineup: Melvin Seals - keyboards;

! lineup: Greg Errico - drums;
! lineup: Elisecia Wright - vocals;
! lineup: Shirley Faulkner - vocals.

 

JGMF:

! Recording: symbols: % = recording discontinuity; / = clipped song; // = cut song; ... = fade in/out; # = truncated timing; [ ] = recorded event time. The recorded event time immediately after the song or item name is an attempt at getting the "real" time of the event. So, a timing of [x:xx] right after a song title is an attempt to say how long the song really was, as represented on this recording.

! Jerrybase: https://jerrybase.com/events/19821115-02

! JGC: https://jerrygarcia.com/show/1982-11-15-wilkins-theatre-kean-college-union-nj-2/. Commenter Matthew Turkin posts (November 25th, 2015): "was one of the people on the concert committe (CCB) that put on this night and the next year's shows at Kean College. Great shows w great people that helped bring these shows 4 ourselves and all the heads that we knew. The theatre was rockin from the seats to the rafters. 'Never had such a goodtime, in my life before'."

! db: https://etreedb.org/shn/23339 (sbd, shnf, also missing encore); https://etreedb.org/shn/78008 (this fileset). It appears that the early show does not circulate, though Jerrybase gives a setlist.

! map: https://goo.gl/maps/lhE48

! JGBP: http://jerrygarciasbrokendownpalaces.blogspot.com/2012/07/wilkins-theatre-kean-college-1000.html

! listing: Daily Record (Morristown, NJ), November 12, 1982, p. 17; Courier-News (Bridgewater, NJ), November 13, 1982, p. B-13; Philadelphia Inquirer, November 14, 1982, p. 13-J.

! venue: the band itinerary, three newspaper listings, and some tickets give the venue as De'Angelo Gymnasium, while other stubs and conventional reckoning have it as Wilkins Theatre. The JGC comment by Matthew Turkin seems to confirm it was in the Theatre, so somewhere either wires were crossed or plans were changed. update: plans changed

! seealso: JGMF, "Armistice Day Rocker: JGB at Felt Forum, November 11, 1982," URL https://jgmf.blogspot.com/2018/01/armistice-day-rocker-jgb-at-felt-forum.html; JGMF, "Greg Errico hits like a linebacker," URL http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2017/07/greg-errico-hits-like-linebacker.html.

! R: field recordist: Jim Vita

! R: field recording gear: 2x Sennheiser 421 > Sony D-5

! R: field recording location: 16th row center

! R: Transfer and FLAC encoding by David Minches: Master cassette played back on Nakamichi Dragon > ART DI/O > Digital Audio Labs Card Deluxe soundcard > Cool Edit 2000 > flac encoding > FLAC.

! R: Jim Vita pulled a pretty good one this night - the vocals are low, but that's fine since they sound fatigued here at the end of the tour (as they may well have at the start, in this period). The bass is especially well captured, and the drums are very present, not least because Errico just crushes those fuckers.

! R: l-t01 mistracked, tune starts at about :23

! P: l-t02 MITR vocals shaky out of the gate, as they often were. Nice energy, fluid playing. John is making himself heard here. Errico bashes.

! P: l-t03 HTC man, Errico is just HAMMERING the start. Great energy from John, too.

! P: l-t05 MT frenetically paced

! l-t08 (1) JG: "See ya later."

Which Side Are You On?

I got a few hours at the San Francisco State University Labor Archives and Research Center to see if the haystack would yield any needles about ol' Joe Garcia, recalling that Jerry had said his pops had had some hassle with the musicians' union.

What we think we know

Blair narrates that in April 1937 Ruth became pregnant, and "around this time an incident occurred that forced Joe Garcia to quit playing music professionally".[i]

Jerry's aunt Leonor recalled:

He'd been out of work for a little while, and then he was offered a good job: There was a big, new nightclub being opened in San Francisco out at the beach [perhaps the Nut Club], and they asked him if he and his orchestra would like to play, and of course that was a big break, so he said sure. They told him they wanted to put him on the radio to show people what a great orchestra he had, but they told him, 'We won't pay you the first time you play; we just want to see how it turns out.' Joe was very ignorant about this kind of stuff and they did play for the radio for free and then when the club opened they played there for free the first time, too. When the musicians' union found out he'd played for free they suspended him for six months and fined him something like $1,500, which was a lot of money in those days. Joe was shocked. He didn't know he had done anything wrong. So he said, 'To hell with this,' and he quit playing.[ii]

What I found

At the meeting of the Board of Directors of the American Federation of Musicians Local 6 in San Francisco of October 17, 1933, Joe Garcia appeared "for questioning re activities before making application to join organization." The Board would "accept Garcia as member if information is without foundation" and concurred "in action of officers in permitting him to accept engagement at Dugout pending" his appearance.[iii]

A week later, the Board took up Joe's membership application. Garcia "admits answering questions on application falsely … explains his activities since in this jurisdiction and that he worked at Bagdad Ballroom while on National Unfair List … Admits membership in Los Angeles Local." The Board's "Secretary reads letter from Los Angeles Local [no. 47] advising that Garcia was dropped from their rolls for non-payment of dues, etc. Board rules Garcia must straighten his accounts with Los Angeles Local, and instructs Secretary to return down payment on admission fee, advise Los Angeles Local of his activities and that Garcia must be taken from job at Dug-Out."[iv]

At a special meeting two days later, the Board discussed Garcia's membership. It first read a telegram from local no. 47 (L.A.) indicating a $50 fee plus dues owed from his Bagdad Ballroom gigs. So the Board agreed to "accept Garcia as a new member on payment of $23 due Los Angeles Local, $50 Federation fine and $50 added $50 initiation fee, a total of $123 cash", and dropped its objection to him gigging at the Dugout.[v] As of the November 7, 1933 meeting he was recognized as a member.[vi]

The next reference I found to Joe Garcia was when he was dropped from the rolls around September 30, 1943.

Interpretation

I am not quite sure how to square these various things. I am about 99.9% sure the Joe Garcia being discussed in 1933 is Jerry's dad - he is identified as a saxophonist and clarinetist, and Blair informs us that he spent some time in LA.  Beyond that, the evidence diverges from the existing account. The troubles started in 1933, not 1937. There's no evidence around the radio, a six month suspension, or a $1,500 fine, which is an order of magnitude higher than the $123 the papers say he was made to pay. What's more, while Leonor suggests that he up and quit, the evidence suggests that he kept his union membership for a decade after the initial hassle.

Memory is a fickle thing, and we call it family lore rather than family fact for a reason. Maybe I have the wrong Joe Garcia, especially leaving the union in 1943 - he could well have decided to bag the whole thing back in FDR's first term and gotten the bar going. There is almost certainly more to find in the union archives, for those who might be inclined to look. And, since my imaginary intrepid fellow researcher is already digging back into the haystack, perhaps they might look for evidence around Tillie Olsen, Jerry's grandmother who was active in the laundry workers' union and the CIO, or the sailor's union next to the Garcia family bar at 1st and Harrison. Always more to do!

---

[i] Jackson 1999, 6.

[ii] Jackson 1999, 6.

[iii] Musical News v. 16 n. 11 (November 1933), p. 12.

[iv] Musical News v. 16 n. 12 (December 1933), p. 5.

[v] Musical News v. 16 n. 12 (December 1933), p. 7.

[vi] Musical News v. 16 n. 12 (December 1933), p. 10.

I work for the union

Garcia was a member of the American Federation of Musicians (AFM), local no. 6 in San Francisco.

He initially applied on August 24, 1965 and was approved for membership one week later. He gave his address as 71 Miguel Street, San Francisco, claiming to have resided there for four years. He claims his occupation as music teacher. Question #29 asks "Have you played any professional engagements during the time you were not a member of the Federation, and if so, where and with whom?" Answer: no (of course).

Like a lot of creative types, Garcia was paperwork-challenged, as indicated by his very messy card.

• Applied 8/24/85;
• Admitted 8/31/65;
• Dropped 4/12/66;
• Readmitted to membership 7/16/66;
• dropped 3/31/68;
• Readmitted to membership 7/13/68;
• dropped 3/31/69;
• readmitted 4/3/70;
• dropped 6/30/72;
• readmitted 9/21/72;
• suspended w/ $100 fine 3/25/74
• dropped 9/30/74;
• readmitted 5/12/75;
• dropped 12/31/80
• readmitted 3/26/81, con't to 9/21/82
• But: 7/27/82 letter threatening JG's membership (I think for unpaid gig dues, not membership, paid up 8/24/82

I don't know if he got someone to keep his paperwork together after that time (I think so) or if there were more ebbs and flows that I just wasn't able to pin down.

The McNally-Arnold Jerry Garcia List

It's very meta, but I do have a lot to say about The List Tradition which I hope to get to. Let me just point out something that I think is interesting: The Garcia stuff on the typescript McNally-Arnold Jerry Garcia List (McNally and Arnold, ND), which became the Garcia list in Deadbase IX, entered the ether through The Jerry Site, and lives still at Jerrybase) derived from the same ur-source as the Soto-Arnold GD List, union gig contracts.

Working musicians pretty much have to join the American Federation of Musicians, AFM Local No. 6 in San Francisco, (previously?) at 116 Ninth Street, just a few blocks off Market. Every gig or session played by a union member has to be filed with the union. These union contracts were seemingly systematically kept by the GD organization. Don't want any trouble with the union, I guess. Anyway, these union contracts, held in GD/Garcia business files, were the basis for both Lists. I don't know whether Janet Soto also compiled the Garcia list, but I sure would like to know whom we have to thank for the bounty of data that we have so long enjoyed around Garcia On The Side!

Quick meta, just can't avoid it: gotta love how modern bureaucratic organizations document themselves; indeed, it's almost redundant to point it out.