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Bob Dylan did not invent his style.

Dylan Imitated Ramblin Jack Elliott

Ramblin' Jack Elliott Prize winner was Woody Guthrie's protégé. Woody Guthrie, never owned the melody to This Land is Your Land, Guthrie wrote the lyrics. The melody is a total lifting from AP Carter's "Little Darling Pal of Mine" and Guthrie did not write a note of it.
Then came Bob Dylan, doing the Guthrie-Elliott thing, he was called a poor man's Elliott (Jack, in turn, had been called a poor man's Guthrie). On April 12, 1963, it was Harold Leventhal who presented 21-year-old Bob Dylan in his first major concert-hall appearance.
Ramblin Jack Elliott says: "I suppose I taught Bobby a few of my songs. Those old VD songs by Woody that nobody wanted the young kids to know, he picked them up from me..."quoted in Robert Shelton, No Direction Home, London 1987, p. 104.

Bob Dylan says: "But you can't just copy somebody. If you like someone's work, the important thing is to be exposed to everything that person has been exposed to. Anyone who wants to be a songwriter should listen to as much folk music as they can, study the form and structure of stuff that has been around for 100 years. I go back to Stephen Foster."

Bob Dylan wins the Nobel Prize in Literature 2016 "for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition".

Nobel panel gives up knockin' on Dylan's door
Days after being awarded the literature prize, Bob Dylan has yet to get in touch with the Swedish Academy, or indicate whether he will attend the celebrations.

A member of the Swedish Academy that awarded the 2016 Nobel Prize in literature to Bob Dylan says the American singer-songwriter's silence since receiving the honor is "impolite and arrogant." Per Wastberg said Dylan's lack of reaction to the honor the academy bestowed on him last week was predictable, but disrespectful nonetheless. "One can say that it is impolite and arrogant. He is who he is," Wastberg was quoted as saying in Saturday's edition of the Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter. Wastberg said the academy still hopes to communicate with the 75-year-old artist, whose Nobel credits him with creating "new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition." "We have agreed not to lift a finger. The ball lies entirely on his half," Wastberg told the newspaper. apnews.com

1981 song,"The Groom's Still Waiting at The Altar."
"Try to be pure at heart, they arrest you for robbery," part of the lyrics say.
"Mistake your shyness for aloofness, your silence for snobbery."

  • He not busy being born is busy dying.
  • You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.
  • No one is free, even the birds are chained to the sky.
  • Behind every beautiful thing, there's some kind of pain.
  • I think women rule the world and that no man has ever done anything that a woman either hasn't allowed him to do or encouraged him to do.
  • Play it fuckin' loud!
  • Gonna change my way of thinking, make my self a different set of rules. Gonna put my good foot forward and stop being influenced by fools.
  • A man is a success if he gets up in the morning and gets to bed at night, and in between he does what he wants to do.
  • Sometimes it's not enough to know what things mean, sometimes you have to know what things don't mean.
  • May God bless and keep you always,
    May your wishes all come true,
    May you always do for others
    And let others do for you.
    May you build a ladder to the stars
    And climb on every rung,
    May you stay forever young,

New Yorker says.... The debate over the proper categorization of Bob Dylan's talent has been going on for more than fifty years.

The Origins of Folksongs

Plagiarism in Dylan, or a Cultural Collage?
writing songs that are information collages. Allusions and memories, fragments of dialogue and nuggets of tradition have always been part of Mr. Dylan's songs, all stitched together like crazy quilts. Bob Dylan exposed as one more plagiarist or is this Fair Use?

How some Teachers Feel About Fair Use

Lefsetz, It All Comes Down To Education, Values and...
They weren't us. Bob Dylan was us. Growing up middle ... see Marty Scorcese's Bob Dylan documentary "No Direction Home". It ... It wasn't about Dylan so much as CREATIVITY! INSPIRATION

Interview By Robert Hilburn, Times Staff Writer "Songwriting Rock's Enigmatic Poet Opens a Long-Private Door"
http://www.calendarlive.com/Music/pop/cl-ca-dylan04apr04,0,3583678.story
Bob Dylan learned from the Carter Family and Edgar Allan Poe, he confides. And in 1963 he wrote 'Blowin' in the Wind' in 10 minutes.
INFLUENCES:
'Big River' - Johnny Cash
'River of Jordan' - The Carter Family
'Too Much Monkey Business' - Chuck Berry and
'Talking Dustbowl Blues' - by Woody Guthrie

Bob Dylan & Joan Baez - Blowin' In The Wind (1976)

 

Oral Tradition Volume 22, Number 1 Bob Dylan's Performance Artistry March 2007

Joel Bernstein - Musician, Archivist
Joel Bernstein photographer authority on Joni Mitchel, Bob Dylan, and Neil Young. View Joel Bernstein's Library

Allan Lomax Musicologist Personal Memories 1915...
neglected cultures and silenced people into the communications chain". Bob Dylan lauded him quite simply as a "missionary". His field recordings with the likes of Leadbelly, Muddy
http://www.edu-cyberpg.com/Teachers/folkAlanLomax.html

Famous Quotes, Fun Musical Quotes and other Quote...
is a friend of mine." - Bob Dylan "There is nothing more difficult than talking about music ... his name off the piano."

Military Music the Music of War
War I songs); Buffy Ste. Marie Donovan's "Universal Soldier Bob Dylan " MacNamara's Banned" " Romping Through the Swamp" Dave van Ronk and the Hudson Dusters "Knee Deep in the Big
http://www.edu-cyberpg.com/Music/WarSongs.html

Bob Dylan Turns D.J. May 3 2006
"Theme Time Radio Hour With Your Host Bob Dylan" XM Satellite Radio channel 40.
It's All Right, Ma: 1965

Harold Leventhal, Promoter of Folk Music, Dies at 86

Harold Leventhal, an internationally renowned folk music promoter died on October 4 th 2005. A true pioneer and legend who spaned music history over the past 50 years. until the close of the 20th century. From the cold war to rock 'n' roll. he remained an unreconstructed folkie to the end of his life.
Harold Leventhal was born on May 24, 1919, in Ellenville, N.Y., and grew up on the Lower East Side and in the Bronx where he began his career in the 1930's selling songs for Irving Berlin, to Frank Sinatra, Dinah Shore and Peggy Lee.
During World War II, Mr. Leventhal served in the Army Signal Corps, stationed in India. After the war, Mr. Leventhal returned to New York, where the Weavers were singing "Goodnight, Irene" and "Tzena, Tzena" in Greenwich Village coffeehouses., Mr. Leventhal began managing the group. By 1952, the Weavers, a highly public casualty of the McCarthy blacklist, had been forced to disband. Intent on reuniting them, Mr. Leventhal booked Carnegie Hall for Christmas Eve 1955. He told each of the Weavers that the other three had already agreed to a reunion. He ended up being the one who showed the folk music industry how to produce a concert, how you rent a hall, when you take out the ads. He made them into concert promoters."
Mr. Leventhal had been Woody Guthrie's business manager and later his executor. He was also a founder and trustee Woody Guthrie Foundation and Archives. Mr. Leventhal was the connection between the folk music era of the 50's and the world of the late 60's.
On April 12, 1963, Leventhal presented 21-year-old Bob Dylan in his first major concert-hall appearance. He promoted Guthrie, Joan Baez, Harry Belafonte; Theodore Bikel; Oscar Brand; Johnny Cash; Judy Collins; Arlo Guthrie; Jim Kweskin; the Mamas and the Papas; Holly Near; the New Lost City Ramblers; Phil Ochs; Odetta; Tom Paxton; Peter, Paul and Mary; Jean Ritchie; Martha Schlamme; Earl Scruggs; the Weavers; and Neil Young. Mr. Leventhal occasionally managed performers in other musical genres, like Jacques Brel, Miriam Makeba, Nana Mouskouri, Jean Redpath and Ravi Shankar.
His honors include a Grammy Award in 1989 as a producer of the album "Folkways: A Vision Shared - A Tribute to Woody Guthrie and Leadbelly" (Columbia Records). "Bound for Glory" received two Academy Awards, for music and cinematography.
Mr. Leventhal produced several movies relating to the folk-music world, Alice 's Restaurant" (1969); "Bound for Glory" (1976), a film biography of Woody Guthrie starring David Carradine; and "Wasn't That a Time!" (1982), a documentary about the Weavers' celebrated reunion in 1980. In 2003 Carnegie Hall concert became the basis of a documentary film, "Isn't This a Time!" (2004).. The inspiration for Irving Steinbloom, the folk impresario whose memorial concert sets in motion the plot of the 2003 film comedy "A Mighty Wind."

Bob Dylan
"Hurricane" - vintage video



"Things Have Changed"


"With God On Our Side" from the BBC