Stanford University has shared that it will be offering an online course on the music and culture of The Grateful Dead.
Titled Psychedelia and Groove: The Music and Culture of the Grateful Dead, the six-week-long online course will be comprised of six 50-minute long sessions. It will be divided into three sections.
According to the class’ breakdown via the Stanford University official website, the first section will focus on a historical perspective of the band’s evolution, followed by an analysis of the Dead’s diverse and ever-evolving musical catalogue. The course will end with the band’s cultural impact on society, including its “connection to art, literature, and social change, as well as its unique fan culture and the phenomenon of the ‘Deadhead.’”
It will be taught by journalist and musician David Gans, the producer and host of the nationally syndicated radio show Grateful Dead Hour and co-host of Tales From The Golden Road, a two-hour talk show on SiriusXM’s Grateful Dead Channel. Gans is also the co-author of the book This Is All a Dream We Dreamed: An Oral History of the Grateful Dead.
“Grateful Dead music is collaborative and improvisational. Accordingly, I have invited guest speakers to join me in at least five of the classes. I’ve been an oral historian and a radio interviewer for more than 40 years; I have learned that conversation is a vastly more effective mode of presentation than lecturing,” read Gans’ syllabus for the course.
The course is set to begin on January 22, and costs $405. Registration is open now. Visit here to register.
In other news, it was revealed that Dead & Company are reportedly in talks for 2024 Las Vegas Sphere residency.
The New York Post reported that the supergroup – consisting of Grateful Dead members Bob Weir, Mickey Hart and Bill Kreutzmann alongside John Mayer, Oteil Burbridge and Jeff Chimenti – are in talks for a potential residency that would take place “next summer”. However, it stressed that negotiations are “still in the works and not 100%.”
Dead & Company embarked on a supposed “farewell” tour this summer but Weir wrote on Twitter: “Well it looks like that’s it for this outfit; but don’t worry we will all be out there in one form or another until we drop…”
Word of Dead & Company’s disbanding first emerged earlier this year, when in April, Rolling Stone speculated that their North American tour for summer ’22 would be their last. The article cited “sources close to Dead & Company” as their point of reference, as well as recent health issues for Kreutzmann. Weir, however, was quick to deny the rumours, tweeting that the band’s plans to break up were “news to me”.
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