Happy 70th Birthday Donna Jean Godchaux: Joining The Grateful Dead On New Year’s Eve 1971

Former Grateful Dead vocalist Donna Jean Godchaux celebrates her 70th birthday today. The Alabama native broke into the music business in the mid-1960s singing in a backing group Southern Comfort in Muscle Shoals. After moving west, she and her husband, the late keyboardist Keith Godchaux, became members of the Grateful Dead between late-1971 and early-1979.

Donna’s ongoing career has seen stints in the Jerry Garcia Band and the Heart Of Gold Band, and she’s collaborated with the likes of the Zen Trickers, Dark Star Orchestra, Jeff Mattson and with her former band mates in Dead & Company. It was her collaboration with the Dead at Winterland in San Francisco on New Year’s Eve in 1971 that truly altered the trajectory of her career as she took the stage alongside her husband and started playing in the band.

At the conclusion of the Dead’s first set on December 31, 1971, Donna emerged to join guitarist Bob Weir in singing “One More Saturday Night.” The song at that time was relatively new to the band’s repertoire, having made its debut in October on the same night Keith first performed as a member of the legendary group.

Revisit Donna’s first sit-in with the Grateful Dead on NYE in 1971 below: