"Fire on the Mountain"
Song by the Grateful Dead
from the album Shakedown Street
ReleasedNovember 15, 1978
Recorded1978
GenreRock
Length3:46
LabelArista
Composer(s)Mickey Hart
Lyricist(s)Robert Hunter
Producer(s)Lowell George

"Fire on the Mountain" is a song by the Grateful Dead. The lyric is by Robert Hunter and the music by drummer Mickey Hart.[1] It was commercially released on the album Shakedown Street in November 1978. An earlier instrumental version titled "Happiness is Drumming" appeared in 1976 on Mickey Hart's album Diga with the Diga Rhythm Band.

Prior to the Dead recording, the song premiered at a concert on March 18, 1977 in San Francisco.[2] That night, as almost always, it was coupled with "Scarlet Begonias" during live performances, producing lengthy musical improvisations. The paired songs were soon nicknamed "Scarlet Fire".[1] The sequence typically timed from 20 to 25 minutes. The November 1, 1979 performance at Nassau Coliseum, Uniondale, New York, likely the longest, clocks in over 34 minutes.

"Fire on the Mountain" was performed in concert by the Grateful Dead 253 times between 1977 and 1995.[3] It appears on numerous Grateful Dead albums.[4] An outtake of the song appeared as a bonus track on the 2004 reissue of Terrapin Station.

This song is also featured as downloadable content for the video game Rock Band.

Other versions

  • Leftover Salmon parodied the song with a version called "Pasta On the Mountain", which appeared on their 1993 release Bridges to Bert.
  • In a 2000 show at Solebury High School in New Hope, Pennsylvania, the band Ween played the song live.
  • In 2008, Keller Williams released a bluegrass version of the song on the album Rex (Live at the Fillmore).[5]
  • Daniel Donato recorded the song on his 2020 album A Young Man's Country
  • Mt. Joy played the song at the Capitol Theatre on April 11, 2022.[6]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 Dodd, David. "The Annotated "Fire on the Mountain"". The Annotated Grateful Dead Lyrics. Retrieved 2007-01-31.
  2. ↑ "Grateful Dead Live at Barton Hall - Cornell University on 1977-05-08". 8 May 1977.
  3. ↑ Scott, John W.; Dolgushkin, Mike; Nixon, Stu (1999). DeadBase XI: The Complete Guide to Grateful Dead Song Lists. Cornish, New Hampshire: DeadBase. p. 102. ISBN 1-877657-22-0.
  4. ↑ "Fire on the Mountain" on the Grateful Dead Family Discography
  5. ↑ "Keller Williams Releases Grateful Grass DOS for Rex". Rex Foundation.
  6. ↑ Twitter https://twitter.com/capitoltheatre/status/1513874709129084933. Retrieved 2022-04-15. {{cite web}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
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