The music world mourns the loss of Bobby Weir, a founding member of the Grateful Dead, whose death was announced Saturday via a statement on his Instagram page.
“It is with profound sadness that we share the passing of Bobby Weir,” the statement read. “He transitioned peacefully, surrounded by loved ones, after courageously beating cancer as only Bobby could. Unfortunately, he succumbed to underlying lung issues.”
Weir joined the Grateful Dead, originally known as the Warlocks, in San Francisco in 1965 at age 17.
For the next 30 years, he toured extensively with the band alongside fellow singer and guitarist Jerry Garcia, who died in 1995.
Weir was instrumental in creating some of the band’s most beloved songs, including “Sugar Magnolia,” “One More Saturday Night,” and “Mexicali Blues.”
In the years following the Grateful Dead’s heyday, Weir continued to pursue other musical projects, including Dead and Company. “For over sixty years, Bobby took to the road,” the Instagram statement noted, describing him as a “guitarist, vocalist, storyteller, and founding member of the Grateful Dead. Bobby will forever be a guiding force whose unique artistry reshaped American music.”
Weir’s passing leaves drummer Bill Kreutzmann as the only surviving original member of the band, following the death of founding bassist Phil Lesh in 2024. Dead and Company recently celebrated the Grateful Dead’s 60th anniversary with a series of concerts in July at Golden Gate Park in San Francisco.
Born in San Francisco and raised in nearby Atherton, Weir was the Grateful Dead’s youngest member and initially appeared as a fresh-faced high-schooler. Over time, he adopted a long beard similar to Garcia’s. The band, known for its devoted fanbase of Deadheads, outlasted the hippie era from which it emerged, maintaining a near-constant touring schedule.
Reflecting on the band’s legacy, Weir remarked when the Grateful Dead received the Grammys’ Musicares Person of the Year honor last year, “Longevity was never a major concern of ours. Spreading joy through the music was all we ever really had in mind, and we got plenty of that done.”