Fare Tom Constanten Well: Grateful Dead Pianist Announces Farewell Tour With Live Dead & Brothers

Keyboardist Tom Constanten, a member of the Grateful Dead from 1968 – 1970, will retire from the touring later this year. Constanten will first embark on a farewell tour this fall with Live Dead & Brothers.

Live Dead & Brothers features actual and legacy members from the extended Grateful Dead and The Allman Brothers Band families performing music from both bands’ 1969 – 1973 era. Constanten is joined in the band by bassist Berry Duane Oakley (Allman Betts Band), guitarists Les Dudek (Allman Brothers Band) and Mark Karan (RatDog), keyboardist Scott Guberman (Phil Lesh & Friends) and drummer Pete Lavezzoli (Oteil Burbridge & Friends).

“The past couple of years I’ve been enjoying a relatively comfortable semi-retirement. I’ve been thinking of going the rest of the way,” Tom Constanten wrote on his Facebook page. As Moms Mabley put it ‘You’s as old as you feels, until one day you wakes up and you feels as old as you is.’ Well, I turned 80 earlier this year, and it’s hard to not notice I’ve lost a step or three. So I’ve been thinking of removing the ‘semi’ from the equation.”

The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductee will continue writing and recording music but is ready to step away from the road. “I am abjectly grateful for the many who have been so helpful along the way. The indulgences I’ve enjoyed have been ramping up over the past few years. There have been signs, though. When they get you a wheelchair without your asking when you check in at the airport, for instance,” Constanten added.

Live Dead & Brothers will kick off their fall tour in Irving, Texas on September 6. Additional stops across Texas follow through September 20 before the second leg of Constanten’s farewell tour with the band begins on September 26 in Buffalo. Up next are shows in Albany (New York), Strausstown (Pennsylvania), Washington D.C., Sellersville (Pennsylvania), Hopewell (Virginia), Annapolis (Maryland), Belleville (Ontario), Canandaigua (New York), Warrendale (Pennsylvania) and Boalsburg (Pennsylvania). The tour is currently slated to end on October 12 in Syracuse, New York.

Tickets for all dates are on sale now. Scroll below for a full list of Live Dead & Brothers/Tom Constanten tour dates.