Dead / Riders Wesleyan University Middletown, CT on 5/3/1970

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A nice slice of history. Starts at 26 min with acoustic Jerry and Bobby. Then some New Riders. Then Dead.

Quality is iffy, but just miraculous it exists. I'm sure one of these AI guys will clean it up.

There is some interesting info (and photos) out there about this show if you have time to do some research /  reading. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=en7CmmweLZU

Lesh had driven over with Mickey and stopped at Mickey's aunt's house on the way over from Harpur College the night before… There were satchels of powder in that GD Ryder truck that members of the band were visiting, and I remember GD manager Sam Cutler looking at his watch as well at the co-eds while waiting for Mickey and Phil to show… I also recall that Weir and Garcia hit the stage and did some acoustic things while waiting for the rest of the band to show up…

 

 video of the 5/3/70 show held in the Wesleyan library media collection, Special Collections & Archives department:
http://www.wesleyan.edu/libr/schome/FAs/me1000-78.xml
It’s viewable only onsite, by appointment; but a local correspondent went to see the video, and brought back a detailed report.

It’s a black & white video, about 65 minutes long, documenting many of the events of the day on Foss Hill. It was filmed by a handheld camera; the sound is often muffled or unclear; and the picture quality is poor, with many edits or stoppages, lines, pops, wobbles & breakups. (The library viewing DVD comes at the end of a chain of copies, from the original Scotch videotape to Sony Betacam to VHS to DVD, so the master video probably looked a bit better.) There is as much crowd footage as concert footage; many songs are skipped, and it was distant from the stage, making the band a bit hard to see. Not only that, but it stops early in the Dead’s electric set. 

OS 7a-c: The Grateful Dead, Live at Wesleyan, May 3, 1970

See also DVD 8 for viewing copy and VTW 53d for VHS copy.

VTW 53a/OS 7a: Scotch 1 inch video tape on reel [master]

VTW 53b-c/OS 7b-c: Sony Betacam SP

Very cool, thanks for posting. The day before Kent State...

Epic!

Sweet vintage footage 

Thanks for Sharing that!

Good stuff

Cool find, Alan, but it is pretty hard to watch and listen to. I hope the AI YouTube guy can work wonders with this miracle.

Thanks! Cross posted..

Only tangentially relevant to the thread - but after the 4/17 & 18/82 shows in Hartford I was privileged to pay a visit to an old gal-pal who was attending Wesleyan University.   She took me on a tour of the labyrinth of subterranean tunnels that connected many of the buildings on campus and the walls were filled with psychedelic era art including a massive Stealy and  huge portraits of Jimi, Janis, Jim Morrison and Jerry.

Also - no on mentions this - but according to the poster, the show was opened by the Kinks who touring behind their hit: Lola.

 

>>>> labyrinth of subterranean tunnels that connected many of the buildings on campus and the walls were filled with psychedelic era art including a massive Stealy and  huge portraits of Jimi, Janis, Jim Morrison and Jerry.

 

The art was still there in 87. My buddy and I would enter a building off campus. Sneak through the labyrinth to our girlfriends dorm. Spend the night then sneak back out the way we came before sunrise.

On our last visit we entered the catacombs before sunrise to leave. Something was different. We could hear a strange noise in the distance. 

As we got closer it was a saxophone. A guy was playing in the labyrinth and its echoes could be heard far away.

We had to go past him to get home. We thought maybe it was a teacher ready to bust us. Nope just a guy and his sax.

The Kinks did not open this show, the "poster" is a fantasy/bootleg piece made up by Wild Bill's Nostalgia in CT over 30+ years after the fact. Just the GD and the Riders at this one, no legitimate pre-show advertising has surfaced.