New Riders of the Purple Sage, a band formed in 1969 as a collaboration of Jerry Garcia and John Dawson, will play at The Green Spot in Coos Bay on Saturday, Dec. 6. From left are Ron Penque, Johnny Markowski, Michael Salzarano, Buddy Cage and David Nelson. Contributed Photo

They’ve performed with musical greats such as Jefferson Airplane, Janis Joplin, Bob Dylan and many more. On Dec. 6, members of the New Riders of the Purple Sage, the band that began as a side project by Jerry Garcia, are bringing their talent and years of experience to Coos Bay (see Scene & Heard).

The band began in 1969 as a part-time spinoff from The Grateful Dead when Garcia, who wanted to be able to play his new pedal steel guitar, joined with Phil Lesh on bass, Mickey Hart on drums, John Dawson, guitar and vocals and David Nelson on guitar, according to the band’s Web site, http://www.thenewriders.com/.

Things changed over the first couple of years. By 1970, Dave Torbert had replaced Lesh and Spencer Dryden, formerly of Jefferson Airplane, became the group’s drummer.

The band was popular in San Francisco Bay Area nightclubs and began opening for The Dead. Finding himself overcommitted between the two groups, Garcia looked for a replacement. He found that in Buddy Cage.

Cage, talking on the phone from New York on Monday, said Garcia approached him while they were on the Festival Express, the legendary 1970 train tour across Canada taken by some of the world’s biggest rock bands. Cage was traveling with Ian and Sylvia Tyson, Canadian folk musicians.

“Garcia asked me on the train to do this job,” Cage said. “I said, ‘Look at you guys, are you serious?’

“He was the most sweet guy. You couldn’t turn him down.”

At age 24, Cage, who already had played the pedal steel for a decade, joined New Riders.

“To be experienced, if you’ve been doing a certain thing for 10 years, you’ve earned a Ph.D. at it,” Cage said. “You get pretty damn good.”

New Riders released its first album in 1971. In the next 11 years the band toured and released over 12 albums, selling more than 4 million records.

Cage remained with the band, except for a brief departure in 1978 to join the short-lived San Francisco All Stars. But in 1982 Nelson and Cage left the band.

“The thing was, after a certain amount of time, you ran out of charm and imagination,” Cage said. “We broke the band up.”

In Sept. 2002, New Riders received a Lifetime Achievement Award from High Times magazine at their Doobie Awards.

Even though Cage was involved in new projects, he said he and Dawson, who retired in 1997, kept an eye on what was happening with the band.

“All the time I was doing that, Nelson and I bi-coastally were kind of the stewards of New Riders,” keeping Dawson’s original songs out of the hands of what Cage called “sharks.”

“His music is still safe,” Cage said. “I’m kind of proud of that.”

In 2005, Cage began to take interest in the band again. He teamed up again with Nelson and the current touring lineup: Michael Falzarano (Hot Tuna) on guitar and vocals, Ronnie Penque (The Penque Brothers) on bass and vocals and Johnny Markowski (Stir Fried) on drums and vocals.

Now the band is not only performing Dawson’s songs from the early years, but is incorporating new songs written by The Dead’s lyricist Nelson and others.

It’s just been enthralling,” Cage said. “A big-time treat.”

Hunter’s song, Blues Barrel, which will be on a CD being released in March, was created during an improvisational jam.

“The drummer just started out with this slow funk thing,” Cage said, “and Nelson said, ‘That’s it!’ If you don’t start boogying to that tune, then you’ve flatlined.”

With all their new music, Cage prefers to call the band a renaissance rather than a reunion. And, happily, New Riders is attracting a new group of younger fans.

“If we had to depend on having to play to old fans, we’d be dead in a year,” Cage said. “We don’t sell out Madison Square Gardens, but I’ve been pretty comfortable with the crowds we’ve had.”