Listen To Jerry Garcia, David Grisman & Doug Sahm Cover Hank Williams

Grateful Dead guitarist Jerry Garcia had a dalliance with the pedal steel guitar for a period of time spanning April 1969 until around 1974. During that time, Garcia recorded one of the best-known pedal steel guitar parts ever recorded when he contributed to the standout Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young song “Teach Your Children.”

Written by Graham Nash, “Teach Your Children” appeared on CSNY’s 1970 album Déjà Vu. The song’s introductory pedal steel guitar part has likely introduced Garcia’s playing to countless unassuming listeners.

Garcia co-founded the New Riders Of The Purple Sage playing pedal steel on their 1971 self-titled debut album. Garcia played pedal steel on a few tracks that appeared on his 1972 solo album, Garcia, as well as on “Looks Like Rain” on fellow Dead guitarist Bob Weir’s 1972 solo album, Ace. Garcia played a pedal steel guitar in 1972 during Grateful Dead performances of “Looks Like Rain,” including a few times on their Europe ‘72 Tour.

In November 1972, Garcia played pedal steel guitar at a one-off concert held on Thanksgiving night with renowned keyboardist Leon Russell. Another musician who was part of the all-star performance at Armadillo World Headquarters in Austin was acclaimed Texas-native singer-songwriter Doug Sahm.

“I’m part of [fellow Texas native country musician] Willie Nelson’s world, and I love it,” said Sahm – who was born on this date in 1941. “But at the same time I’m part of the Grateful Dead’s world.”

A few weeks after the Thanksgiving gig, Sahm was in San Francisco where he joined Garcia and Merl Saunders at one of their regular jams at the Keystone. Sahm described the experience in an article written by John Swenson that ran in Crawdaddy in May 1973. Sahm’s description of the events (without original stylization) follows (via Fate Music):

“Garcia and I [have] been playing a lot lately. We been doing that gig, boy, it’s just too much. We used to play together a lot when I was in [San] Frisco, but then we got back together again down in Texas. We took him out to the farm, it was beautiful man. Turned him on to Big Red. We was driving around and got lost and I said, ‘Hey man we gotta stop here … this is what you do in Texas when you get lost and out of it, you know, you stop and you get a Big Red. Get a couple of them and you sit down and think it over.’

“We sat down and (slurp slurp) then we said, ‘OK let’s go this way’ and that was it. But anyway, we decided we wanted to get together with Leon [Russell], he wanted to come down so we called him and he came down to Austin. Jerry was there and we cooked. There were 1500 people there free and we had a get off, it was just incredible, never got off so hard singing and playing. Me and Jerry’d swap choruses and Jerry played steel and Leon sang and I sang. That was Thanksgiving in Texas. It was free because nobody could ever afford it, probably it just happened free because the Dead were playing around there and we had a day off and just did it.

“Then we went back up to Frisco and did it at Keystone with Tom Fogerty where Jerry does that jam thing, we kinda learned a few tunes and said we’ll go see what this audience looks like. making that trip and it was just that monster same reaction.”

That December 1972 trip to the Bay Area also saw Sahm do some recording at Wally Heider’s studio, where Déjà Vu, Garcia and albums by the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane and others had been recorded. Sahm, who had previously recorded at Wally Heider’s in September 1972, recruited Garcia and mandolinist David Grisman for the December 2, 1972 session, which included recording a cover of Hank Williams’ “Leave Me Alone With The Blues.”

Sahm, who would play bajo sixto guitar on the Grateful Dead’s 1973 album, Wake Of The Flood, brought in piano player Augie Meyers and guitarist Jack King for the session at Heider’s. They also recorded the lesser-known Ned Miller song, “From A Jack To A King.” (One source indicates “A Mansion On The Hill” and “Here We Go Again” were also recorded during the session at Heider’s).

Released as bonus tracks to a 2003 Sahm compilation entitled The Genuine Texas Groover, stream “Leave Me Alone With The Blues” and “From A Jack To A King,” featuring Garcia and Grisman below: