Jorma Kaukonen, founding member of San Francisco’s psychedelic pioneers, Jefferson Airplane, has shared an official statement in recognition of the band’s 60th anniversary. On August 13, 1965, Jefferson Airplane performed their first concert at the Matrix, presently known as the White Rabbit Bar, in recognition of the group’s performance history in the vicinity and the band’s own Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland-inspired track. 

Addressing Jefferson Airplane’s six-decade milestone, Kaukonen said: 

Spring of 1965… I had just graduated from the University of Santa Clara, and I had been married for about six months. The war in Vietnam was filling our gardens of stone, and if there was change in the air, it hadn’t yet begun to manifest itself to me. With my graduation from college, my parents finally removed my financial feather bed, and life’s little evolutions were becoming realities. What to do? What to do?

As long as I was still in school, there were no truly life-changing decisions I needed to make. I did just enough schoolwork to graduate, and the rest of the time I simply played the guitar, hung out with my like-minded friends, and waited for the next gig to come up.

Now I don’t remember whether it was July or August when I found myself in the band that would be called Jefferson Airplane. It was probably August, but the details are lost in antiquity. Bob Harvey was playing bass, and Skip Spence had yet to replace Jerry Peloquin behind the drums. It was a long time ago. By the time August 13, 1965 rolled around, we were Jefferson Airplane, and we were ready to play our first gig at the little club on Fillmore Street, where we found ourselves involved. That club would be the Matrix.

One thing would lead to another. Jack Casady would replace Bob Harvey, Spencer Dryden would replace Skip Spence, who replaced Jerry Peloquin, and Grace Slick would replace Signe Anderson. The rest would be history evolving. Had I not been a reluctant student at Santa Clara University and had I not met Paul Kantner in Santa Cruz on the beach on a fine fall day, who knows what course my life would have taken. 

All these chance meetings have shaped the cascade of my life, and here I am sixty years later on a hot August day in Southeast Ohio, taking a moment to look back with amazement at the synchronicity of events that have brought me thus far. Bob Harvey is gone, Signe Anderson is gone, Skip Spence is gone, Spencer Dryden is gone, Marty Balin is gone, Paul Kantner is gone, but Grace Slick, Jack Casady, and I are still here.

My stumbling into the band that would become Jefferson Airplane certainly changed my life. With this in mind, I give thanks to the universe for the opportunities I have been given to learn, and there you have it. 

Happy Sixtieth Birthday, Jefferson Airplane!

Kaukonen’s message was shared via the blog page on his personal website. For more, visit jormakaukonen.com.

Read the feature that ran to honor the group’s 50th anniversary: Jefferson Airplane Revisit Their Final Flight.