Phil Lesh [ tickets ] and Friends will tour the eastern U.S. in April, visiting more than a dozen cities in less than three weeks, Grateful Dead Productions revealed on Monday (2/5).

Tickets for the April dates can be ordered through the Grateful Dead�s ticketing service; details are available at the GDTS Too website. Tickets will begin to go on sale through traditional ticketing outlets at the end of February.

On all of his currently scheduled dates, Lesh�s oft-changing lineup of Friends is expected to include Jimmy Herring, Warren Haynes, John Molo and Rob Barraco.

Lesh and Friends will open a separate, three-city mini-tour in Denver later this week. The Grateful Dead bass player--who underwent a liver transplant in December of 1999--is using a stop on the February tour as a way to continue his blood drive. He will appear from 12 to 3 p.m. on Saturday, Feb. 10, at Bonfil's Blood Center in Denver. All blood donors will receive a signed poster, according to Lesh�s official website.

Lesh has distanced himself from his former bandmates Bob Weir and Mickey Hart since a late 1999 dispute over how to go about digitizing the band's vault. He did not join his former Grateful Dead bandmates on last year's Furthur Festival.