Near Nirvana: The Nine Times China>Rider and Scarlet>Fire Were Played In The Same Show

I like lists at Christmas, so today I present the nine times that China Cat Sunflower flowed into I Know You Rider and Scarlet Begonias streamed into Fire On The Mountain in the same show!

Luckily I saw two of these, at the New Year's Eve show 1980 in Oakland and the next summer at the Saturday show at the Greek 9-12-1981.  You can listen to any or all of these below.
All the China Riders were in the first set (first electric set in 1980) followed by a second set Scar Fire.

So of the more than 300 times the Dead played Scarlet Fire starting in 1977 to the end in 1995 only 9 were played in the same show as China Rider. You had to be lucky to see one of these babies

Note that three shows in a row in 1980 and 1981 also had a Lost Sailor>Saint of Circumstance in them for a trifecta evening.

These were special nights when you got the double dose. I hope you were there too.  Merry Christmas to everyone and thanks for reading my cryptic notes on my life and yours with the Dead


1. 2-3-79 Indianapolis

2. 11-8-79 Cap Center, a rare later era mid first set China here


3. 10-22-80 Radio City
4. 12-31-80 (I was there) Oakland. Here's the fine Wagner Miller NAK aud.
5. 7-8-81 St Louis Kiel
 6. 9-12-81 (I was there)  The Greek
 7. 12-9-81 For the third 1981 double dose, the Dead move from 9-12 in UC Berkeley to 12-9 at U Colorado. Poetic for the Band
8. 9-4-83 Park West Mountain High
9. 3-28-85
Also see  http://gratefulseconds.blogspot.com/2016/04/scarlet-less-fires-and-fire-less.html  and http://gratefulseconds.blogspot.com/2016/01/china-less-riders-and-rider-less-china.html for more Dead rarities involving these four master classes among Dead tunes.

The Cosmic Durability of the Grateful Dead Traverse Park West September 4, 1983

Hooray, its 1983 Dead.  The band always wanted to play outside in Utah and I can understand that.  When I moved to California on the Green Tortoise in December 1980 just prior to my first fivr night stand, we stopped near El Paso and took a little boat over to Mexico to get some Peyote. Which I enjoyed that night as daylight broke in Utah.  It was only then that I realized that every mountain in Utah was on fire and looked exactly like Mt Rushmore. True story.

Unfortunately I was a spoiled Bay Area Deadhead three years later in 1983 and walked or took Bart to most of my Dead shows instead of a short 1000 or so mile road trip to see an Oudoor Utah show at a ski resort or as the Honolulu Advertiser says in 1983, the cosmic durability of the Grateful Dead.   I heard that Scarlet>Fire is a killer at this show, as it most have been, and there is a nice three song video feed of the show at the bottom of this one.  So enjoy the look and feel and sound of Utah outdoor show in 1983 and tell me what really happened when you show this in person.

This was one of those historic shows with China>Rider and Scarlet>Fire played back to back to back to back.