Bob Weir, the guitarist who co-founded the Grateful Dead, has died aged 78.| Don’s Tunes

With a career spanning more than 60 years, Weir's big break was in 1965 with the founding of the Grateful Dead. Within a few years, they became a force within San Francisco's characteristic counterculture.

Weir wrote or co-wrote and sang lead vocals on Dead classics including "Sugar Magnolia," "One More Saturday Night" and "Mexicali Blues."

"For over sixty years, Bobby took to the road," his family's statement said. "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."

“For me the music occurring at the time, physically when I touch my guitar and play a note, part of my physical self, my corporeal self, is touching that note and that other world.”

Photo by PLATON

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