Grateful Dead’s Bob Weir Dead at 78

Grateful Dead founding member Bob Weir has died. Weir played rhythm guitar and sang lead vocals for the entirety of the Grateful Dead’s 30-year tenure. He also founded and played in several bands during and after his time with the Dead, including Kingfish, the Bob Weir Band, Bobby and the Midnites, Scaring the Children, RatDog, and Furthur. After the Grateful Dead disbanded in 1995, Weir performed with other former members of the band in a group called the Other Ones, later known as the Dead. Weir more recently continued playing with Grateful Dead members Mickey Hart and Bill Kreutzmann, along with John Mayer, in an outfit called Dead & Company.

“It is with profound sadness that we share the passing of Bobby Weir,” the Weir family said in a statement. “He transitioned peacefully, surrounded by loved ones, after courageously beating cancer as only Bobby could. Unfortunately, he succumbed to underlying lung issues.”

They added that Weir’s “final months reflected the same spirit that defined his life. Diagnosed in July, he began treatment only weeks before returning to his hometown stage for a three-night celebration of 60 years of music at Golden Gate Park. Those performances, emotional, soulful, and full of light, were not farewells, but gifts. Another act of resilience.” You can read the full statement below.

Weir was born in San Francisco to Jack Parber and a fellow University of Arizona student, who later gave him up to his adoptive parents. He was raised in the suburb of Atherton, picking up piano and trumpet until finally picking up the guitar at age 13. Due to his undiagnosed dyslexia, Weir was expelled from nearly every school he attended—including Fountain Valley School in Colorado, where he met future Grateful Dead lyricist John Perry Barlow. On New Year’s Eve, 1963, Weir stumbled upon Dana Morgan’s Music Store in Palo Alto, where Jerry Garcia taught guitar. Garcia was there waiting for his student who didn’t show up, and the two ended up jamming together all night. They later started a band called McCree’s Uptown Jug Champions, which then evolved into the Warlocks, and finally became the Grateful Dead.

Weir released his first solo album, Ace, in 1972, followed by 1978’s Heaven Help the Fool. His last LP, 2016’s Blue Mountain, featured contributions from members of the National. Weir was a board member of the Rex Foundation, an organization founded by members of the Grateful Dead to “proactively provide extensive community support to creative endeavors in the arts, sciences, and education.”

Weir Family Statement:

It is with profound sadness that we share the passing of Bobby Weir. He transitioned peacefully, surrounded by loved ones, after courageously beating cancer as only Bobby could. Unfortunately, he succumbed to underlying lung issues.

For over sixty years, Bobby took to the road. A guitarist, vocalist, storyteller, and founding member of the Grateful Dead. Bobby will forever be a guiding force whose unique artistry reshaped American music. His work did more than fill rooms with music; it was warm sunlight that filled the soul, building a community, a language, and a feeling of family that generations of fans carry with them. Every chord he played, every word he sang was an integral part of the stories he wove. There was an invitation: to feel, to question, to wander, and to belong.

Bobby’s final months reflected the same spirit that defined his life. Diagnosed in July, he began treatment only weeks before returning to his hometown stage for a three-night celebration of 60 years of music at Golden Gate Park. Those performances, emotional, soulful, and full of light, were not farewells, but gifts. Another act of resilience. An artist choosing, even then, to keep going by his own design. As we remember Bobby, it’s hard not to feel the echo of the way he lived. A man driftin’ and dreamin’, never worrying if the road would lead him home. A child of countless trees. A child of boundless seas.

There is no final curtain here, not really. Only the sense of someone setting off again. He often spoke of a three-hundred-year legacy, determined to ensure the songbook would endure long after him. May that dream live on through future generations of Dead Heads. And so we send him off the way he sent so many of us on our way: with a farewell that isn’t an ending, but a blessing. A reward for a life worth livin’.

His loving family, Natascha, Monet, and Chloe, request privacy during this difficult time and offer their gratitude for the outpouring of love, support, and remembrance. May we honor him not only in sorrow, but in how bravely we continue with open hearts, steady steps, and the music leading us home. Hang it up and see what tomorrow brings.

Read more about Bob Weir in The Grateful Dead: A Guide to Their Essential Live Songs

Correction: An earlier version of this story stated that Bob Weir met Jerry Garcia on New Year’s Eve, 1962. They met on New Year’s Eve of 1963.