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Joan Osborne joins the Dead for summer tour
The Dead --a group that features the four surviving members of the Grateful Dead--are firming up plans for a summer tour on which singer-songwriter Joan Osborne will handle some vocals.
The tour, dubbed "Summer Getaway 2003," is scheduled to get underway at Tennessee's Bonnaroo Festival on June 15. The first leg runs through July 8, and includes a July 4 stop at Willie Nelson 's annual "picnic" show in Austin, Texas.
Ten shows were listed on the Dead's official website at press time, with more to be confirmed. According to the site, a second leg will run from July 29 through Aug. 10.
Steve Winwood will be on the bill from June 17 through June 25, and Willie Nelson supports from June 27 through July 2. The band's mail-order ticketing is already underway (see its in-house ticketing site for details), and tickets are scheduled to go on sale to the general public on April 12.
The Dead's line-up includes Grateful Dead members Mickey Hart and Bill Kreutzmann (both on percussion), Phil Lesh (on bass) and Bob Weir (vocals and guitar).
It falls to guitarist Jimmy Herring--who paid his jam-band dues over the last dozen years by playing in Col. Bruce Hampton's Aquarium Rescue Unit, Jazz is Dead and the Allman Brothers Band--to fill the void left by late Grateful Dead guitarist Jerry Garcia.
Rounding out the group are Jeff Chimenti (from Weir's Ratdog) on keyboards and Rob Barraco (from Phil Lesh and Friends) on keyboards and vocals.
In August of 2002, the surviving members of the Grateful Dead performed together for the first time since the death of Jerry Garcia during an event at the Alpine Valley Music Theatre in East Troy, Wis. Earlier this year, they changed their name from the Other Ones to the Dead.
The Grateful Dead performed their last show in Chicago on July 9, 1995. Singer-guitarist Garcia died a month later in California after he suffered a heart attack at a substance-abuse treatment facility.
