Nice to read through this old thread. As someone who spent many more years of his life as a Deadhead than as a folkie, I'm glad to see I'm not the only one here to enjoy the Dead.

Of course, Jerry, Bobby and Pigpen were hard-core folk enthusiasts long before they encountered LSD and took up rock, and the band as a whole, of course, evolved from a jug band.

A few factual notes on "side projects" that weren't clear in the above messages:

The New Riders of the Purple Sage were a country-rock band that featured Jerry Garcia on pedal steel guitar. The rest of the band were contemporaries/peers of the members of the GD (i.e., "California hippies," more or less). The New Riders functioned as the Dead's opening act for a couple of years in the early 70s. This meant, of course, that concertgoers got a *lot* of Jerry for the price of admission -- an hour or so sitting at the pedal steel, and then a few more hours standing up and playing the regular electric guitar with the Dead.

Old and In The Way was a bluegrass project featuring Jerry on banjo (his first instrument, if I'm not mistaken), David Grisman on mandolin (who later recorded some great acoustic duets with Jerry during his last years), and Vasser Clements on fiddle (an older-generation non-hippie-type country player). I'm not sure about the others, but I think the bass player might have been John Kahn (who played with Jerry in a couple of other projects), and the guitar might have been Peter Rowan, who may or may not have also been a New Rider. Sorry about the memory lapse.

Old and In The Way existed for only a few months, and released their one album a couple of years after they had broken up.

Jerry made a couple of albums with a Bay Area organist named Merl Saunders. Great rock/soul music. I think John Kahn was the bass player on that project too.