Upcoming Concerts and Talks

Benefit for Tom Constanten, keyboard player for Grateful Dead

Tour: 2pm
Music: 3pm

ABOUT: Tom Constanten Constanten wrote orchestral pieces as a child. He became the 7th member of the Grateful Dead in 1968, recording the band's second album, Anthem of the Sun, while on weekend leave from the Air Force. "It was like a magic carpet ride that was there for me to step on," he says. "I would have been a fool not to." He was inducted into the Rock N Roll Hall of Fame in 1994.

He stated his personal philosophy in a 2002 interview, "I know of no path that is better marked than the study of music. Maybe I just think so because it's the path I'm on. There's the old question "How come there's never enough time to do it right, but there's always enough time to do it over." Well, here's an answer. Settle down. Do it right. However long it takes. That's the direct route to the fast lane!"

He practices what he preaches, and after time in Grateful Dead, Constanten turned to academics and held a Creative Associate fellowship in composition at SUNY Buffalo at their music-oriented Center of the Creative and Performing Arts from 1974-75. In 1986, he was an artist in residence at Harvard University. He also taught at the San Francisco Art Institute.

Constanten also began to tour as a solo pianist, and was the house pianist for the radio program, West Coast Weekend, from 1986 to 1993. He also plays with a number of Grateful Dead tribute bands, including Jazz is Dead, a band which covers classic Dead songs with jazz influences.

Constanten has been an artist in residence off and on at the Mansion for the past 15 years! Keep an eye out for his Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction Award when you tour the Mansion.

Watch Constanten get inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nWQH7Zt8Hk

Proceeds to benefit Tom Constanten