Today, people across the northeast are locked down in their homes waiting out the wrath of Winter Storm Stella. From Virginia to Maine, schools and businesses are shuttered, highways are closed, and all flights into and out of the area are suspended. Blizzard advisory warnings have been issued in nine different states, and the unrelenting mix of heavy snow and frozen rain, rapidly accumulating ice, and gale force winds ensure that nobody here is going anywhere anytime soon.
Stella may have messed with your plans today, but there’s no reason to let the storm get you down. Make a cup of hot cocoa, wrap yourself in a blanket, and turn your Stella Blues into Stella Bliss with this video of The Grateful Dead‘s entrancing rendition of “Stella Blue” from their October 17th, 1974 performance at the Winterland Arena in San Francisco, CA (courtesy of YouTube user friscobay01):
The beautiful performance of the Jerry Garcia/Robert Hunter tune came as part of the Grateful Dead’s acclaimed five-night run at the Winterland Arena which marked the beginning of a two-year hiatus from touring. As with all the band’s performances in 1974, the show featured Owsley “Bear” Stanley‘s storied “Wall of Sound” PA system, which delivered particularly visceral audio quality. The shows were immortalized in 1976 in the form of The Grateful Dead Movie, a fascinating relic of one of the band’s most storied eras. You can listen to the whole show below via archive.org user Jonathan Aizen: