Grahame Lesh on Keeping the Grateful Dead’s Legacy Alive 60 Years Later

The eldest son of the late Grateful Dead bassist Phil Lesh is thrilled to carry on the legacy of the legendary jam band.

“I’m just one of so many people who’s doing it,” Grahame Lesh told PEOPLE from his San Francisco-area home. “Dead & Company’s doing such an amazing job getting new folks into it and keeping the torch going, but honestly, I see it here in the Bay Area so much with all the musicians in our community. There’s a Grateful Dead night almost every day of the week in the Bay Area.”

In early August, the Bay Area will come even more alive with the Dead, too. On Aug. 1-3, Dead & Company, comprised of original Grateful Dead members Bob Weir and Mickey Hart, as well as John Mayer and other musicians, will celebrate 60 years of the Dead’s music with three concerts in Golden Gate Park. Running alongside the three shows will be the Heart of Town, a July 31-Aug. 2 festival at Pier 48 in Mission Rock featuring bands inspired by the Grateful Dead. The festival is hosted by Grahame Lesh and Friends, one of the musicians’ three bands.

“My parents would talk about the Grateful Dead as a big old tree. The roots are the Americana music and the trunk is the original members of the band, and then each of the branches and the leaves are all the people that were inspired by the band, and I’m just one of those,” he says.  “Having an opportunity to celebrate that music that I’ve grown up in, that my family has been a part of since long before I was born, is really special.”

He added, “The No. 1 thing to know about my family, especially musically and artistically, is that it’s really important to all of us to keep that legacy going.”

While Grahame, 38, grew up with the Grateful Dead and traveled with them on tour alongside his father, he doesn’t have a lot of memories of life on the road with the Rock and Roll Hall of Famers.

“I was 8 when [lead singer] Jerry Garcia passed away in ’95, so I didn’t really get a chance to be super inspired by watching the Grateful Dead in person as the Grateful Dead,” he says. “A few years later, my dad started Phil Lesh and Friends, and my family would go on tour with him, and I got to see just countless amazing musicians that would come through that band.”

“He was kind of like an uncle. He was around. I just have a very vivid sense that he was a kind man who was my dad’s really good friend, and I think he was that for everyone,” Grahame says. “It’s crazy growing up in the world of the Grateful Dead. He wasn’t the only one, but he didn’t stop from using the word ‘f—‘ around kids, but in a jolly way. So I kind of remember that, but it was just kind of a funny thing to sort of remember.”

Phil, meanwhile, was a supporter of his son’s Dead-inspired music until his 2024 death, and he even appeared on the song “Jupiter” on Midnight North’s most recent album, Diamonds In The Zodiac. The lyrics for that song were actually written decades ago for a Phil Lesh and Friends project that never finished.

“He really loved that sort of stuff, where I could sort of bring the eras of music together. I mean, this is a song written over 25 years ago, and I think that was really cool for him,” Grahame says.

Phil also taught him to let the music, not guidelines, lead him.

“He just wanted you to play the music in a way that was authentic to the music itself, and that was a way for the music to sound correct. It didn’t matter if it was the same notes that Jerry played. It didn’t matter. You could even change the chords and the melody,” Grahame says.

While the Dead celebrates its 60th anniversary, Grahame is insistent that the music will live on for generations.

“The Grateful Dead will outlast everyone. The music is going to outlive all of us and probably, our kids’ kids,” he says. “Jerry used to say it was running away and joining the circus. There’s something so inherently American and modern about that, and just timeless.”

Over the years, numerous groups and music executives have attempted to study the San Francisco-based band and replicate its success. That, however, is futile.

“They never had a plan. So I see some of these, ‘What Businesses Can Learn from the Grateful Dead’ things. They were just incredibly talented, and they were artists. They were just creating music and experiences, and they did not have a plan,” Grahame says. “There was every chance that they would’ve been unsuccessful in terms of their career, but they didn’t care about that. They just wanted to be successful in terms of creating what they wanted to create, making something real and human and putting on these big experiences.”

The Heart of Town concert series is presented by The San Francisco Giants and Relix, and produced by Terrapin Station Entertainment and Dayglo Presents.