Dark Star Orchestra keeps sound, spirit of Grateful Dead alive

Dark Star Orchestra.

Imitation, they say, is the sincerest form of flattery.

If such is the case, the late great Grateful Dead, the San Francisco band that basically started the entire jam-rock scene in the 1960s, are positively fawned over. In an age when where tribute acts run amok, the legions that have devoted themselves to recreating the music of the Dead are most numerous. Perhaps this is because the group’s sound, steeped in improvisation, lends itself so well to reinterpretation. A website, cheekily called “Uncle John’s Bands” after one of the Dead’s best-known songs, lists nearly 200 acts in the United States alone.

The Dark Star Orchestra: Jeff Matson (from left), Kevin Rosen, Lisa Mackey, Dino English, Rob Koritz, Rob Barraco, Rob Eaton.

Standing Deadheads above them all, however, is Chicago’s Dark Star Orchestra, which performs Friday at Minglewood Hall. One of the oldest Dead tribute acts, Dark Star was founded by guitarist John Kadlecik and keyboardist Scott Larned started the group in 1997, just two years after the disbanding of the original Dead following the death of founding frontman/lead guitarist Jerry Garcia.

From the beginning, Dark Star Orchestra (they took the name from “Dark Star,” another Dead song that, because of its rare and wildly varied inclusion in set lists, was a fan favorite of the band’s live shows) operated under a unique concept: Each and every gig, the septet takes the set list from one of the Dead’s 2,400 recorded and cataloged shows and recreates the concert in its entirety.

“We took the traditional approach of playing the music so that all the parts of the song are there,” says drummer Dino English, who estimates the band has played about 1,800 shows in its 13 years, covering about 1,400 Dead sets. “People think that the Grateful Dead is a lot of improvisation, and it is. But the songs are fairly set, and it’s really the jams where the improv takes place. There’s room within the song as well, but more so than that, there actually are parts to the songs, and we actually play those parts rather than skip over them.”

If that sounds slavish, it’s not. The shows aren’t recreated note for note, nor could they be, given the unpredictable musical excursions the Dead would take from night to night. So while Dark Star begins by remaining true to the original spirit of the songs, after that all bets are off as they also adhere to the Dead’s freewheeling spirit of musical exploration.

“We do sound like the Grateful Dead; however, to the people who really listen to us a lot, they recognize the subtle differences,” says English, who joined Dark Star in 1999. “We don’t find (the tribute band tag) really fits what we’re doing. It doesn’t offend anybody, but it doesn’t really seem like the right label either. We look at it more as a continuation of the music. We’re not dressing up in costumes. We’re looking to create something here and now for the audience that’s right in front of us. When we do these show ‘recreations,’ they’re not really recreations. We’re just using them as a launching pad for our own expression.”

Dark Star’s fidelity to and musical execution of the Dead’s legacy have earned them fans among their heroes’ ranks. Dead members Bob Weir and Bill Kreutzmann, among others, have sat in with the group. Keyboardist Rob Barraco has played with such latter-day Dead offshoots as Phil Lesh & Friends and the Other Ones, and Kadlecik recently left the group to join Weir and Lesh’s new band, Furthur.

Still, even though Dark Star, which also includes Jeff Mattson, Rob Eaton, Kevin Rosen, Lisa Mackey and Rob Koritz, has become fully integrated into the large Dead family, its members do feel the need to break free on their own. The band recently took the first steps toward this by recording the original “Run Mary,” co-written by longtime Dead lyricist Robert Hunter. Studio and live versions of the song can be heard on YouTube, and the group is slowly compiling material for a full album.

“Our focus is fully on Grateful Dead music,” says English. “We’re not going to be a band that plays 50 percent original, 50 percent Grateful Dead. We’re all playing this music because we love it and we feel a purpose in doing. But with the original material we do it because we have to for ourselves.”

Dark Star Orchestra

8 p.m. Friday; Minglewood Hall, 1555 Madison. Tickets: $20 in advance, $22 day of show. Advance tickets available at the box office, by phone at (901) 312-6058 or (866) 609-1744, or online at minglewoodhall.com.

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