Greensky Bluegrass celebrated Robert Hunter‘s 80th birthday on Wednesday by sharing a performance of “Black Muddy River”. The video was shot live at The Pageant in St. Louis, MO as part of The Leap Year Sessions streaming series.
First debuted by the Grateful Dead on December 15th, 1986 at Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum in California, “Black Muddy River” shines as one of the last great Jerry Garcia/Robert Hunter classics. The song would appear the following year on In The Dark, and holds special sentimentality as the final song on which Garcia took lead vocals at what proved to be the last Grateful Dead concert on July 9th, 1995. Though it was Garcia’s last song, the band opted to end the night, the summer tour, and ultimately their time together with a more upbeat “Box Of Rain”.
Since appropriately debuting the Grateful Dead cover on 3/24/15 at Phil Lesh‘s Terrapin Crossroads, Greensky has performed “Black Muddy River” a total of 19 times, including the 9/18/20 rendition, per Phantasy Tour. Prior to The Leap Year Sessions, the band last performed it on 11/2/19 at the Palace Theatre in Saint Paul, MN.
Watch Greensky Bluegrass’ performance of “Black Muddy River”, shared in honor of what would have been Robert Hunter’s 80th birthday on Wednesday.
Greensky Bluegrass – “Black Muddy River” (Grateful Dead)
[Video: GreenskyBluegrass]