What a Long, Strange Trip It’s Been for Rock Concert Promoter Peter Shapiro
Shapiro just published a new book about a life in music bookended by the Grateful Dead
BY EVAN BLEIER
“Sometimes you have to leave it all on the field,” Shapiro (right) says. / C. Taylor Crothers
A day after the Fourth of July in 2015 at Soldier Field in Chicago, the core four members of the Grateful Dead who carried on following the death of Jerry Garcia in 1995 — Bob Weir, Phil Lesh, Bill Kreutzmann and Mickey Hart — ended their time together as a working band during the final show of that summer’s Fare Thee Well tour.
Peter Shapiro, who had the trajectory of his life change after seeing the Dead as a film student at Northwestern in March of 1993 at the Rosemont Horizon in Rosemont, Illinois (about 25 miles away from the band’s final show in Chicago), had organized Fare Thee Well and was in attendance as the final encore of the night, “Attics of My Life,” closed out the tour and ended an era.
Shapiro chronicles his journey from the Rosemont Horizon in ’93 to Soldier Field in ’15 in his new book The Music Never Stops: What Putting on 10,000 Shows Has Taught Me About Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Magic, which was just released today. Co-authored with the assistance of longtime friend and Relix editor-in-chief Dean Budnick, The Music Never Stops chronicles how Shapiro, who owns the nationwide Brooklyn Bowl franchise as well as the Capitol Theatre in Port Chester, New York, and was the owner of the legendary jam band proving grounds Wetlands in NYC’s Tribeca, went from Grateful Dead follower to Grateful Dead organizer by sharing his story through the lens of 50 concerts, including acts ranging from U2 and Phish to The Roots and Jason Isbell, from the last three decades.