Phil Lesh & Friends traded the comfort of their usual home inside northern California’s Terrapin Crossroads for a tent-based performance outside the venue as part of their 2018 Hanukkah Celebration show earlier this week. For this year’s celebratory performance, the former Grateful Dead bassist was joined by Dan Lebowitz, Ross James, and Scott Guberman. Since the show took place during the eight-night Jewish holiday that is Hanukkah, they appropriately mixed in some seasonal tunes including “Hanukkah, Oh Hanukkah”, which the band jammed into during their performance of the Dead’s Americana classic, “New Speedway Boogie” from their 1970’s Workingman’s Dead LP.

The 14-minute performance opens up with a scarf-wearing Lesh playing away on the bass in between his two guitarists for the evening (Lebowitz and James) while going into the Dead deep cut. The instrumental jam part of the song really begins around the video’s 3:30 mark following some solo work exchanged between the two guitar players. It was Lebowitz on the acoustic guitar who initially transitions into the familiar Jewish holiday song right around the 5:45 mark in the video below, much to the surprised happiness of some of the fans in the audience. Lesh can even be seen looking over his shoulder in gleeful surprise as his guitarist takes the song into a more seasonal direction before they eventually head back towards “New Speedway” right after the 9:00 mark.

Phil Lesh & Friends – “New Speedway Boogie” > “Hanukkah, Oh Hanukkah” – 2/4/2018

[Video: C B]

Phil Lesh & Friends recently completed their “On This Day In Dead History” concert series inside his Terrapin Crossroads venue, which was dedicated to recreating select classic Dead performances throughout the years from 1987, 1978, and 1972, respectively. Lesh appears to be done with any major performances throughout the remainder of 2018. He is, however, heading back out on the road for a run of select concerts scheduled for the winter and spring months in 2019. The “tour” will conclude with the band’s scheduled headlining performance at Colorado’s Red Rocks Amphitheatre on May 29th.