If I were to pick a date on which sixties music started, it wouldn’t be January first, 1960. There was some great music during 1960-1962 but for the most part pop music sounded something like this.

Mark Dinning, Teen Angel, 1960

Lyrics

or this….

I would pick November 22nd, 1963. 

It is a day that the world remembers.

I believe that the music of the sixties involved a collision between two icebergs:

-the folk/protest movement, a la Bob Dylan.

-early rock music, a la Beatles

These two ‘icebergs’ were on a collision course in late 1963. About to meet physically in mid 1964:

“On Friday 28 August 1964, in a room in the Delmonico hotel … in New York City… the Beatles encountered Bob Dylan for the first time.” Read this article for the course, it also talks about serendipitous meetings of other musicians.

The Beatles meet Dylan

Back to November 22nd, 1963. The Beatles, who are already getting big in the UK, are featured on a short TV segment in the morning.

The very same afternoon: John Kennedy is assassinated (you can watch it here), less than three years after he becomes President.

The very next evening, Bob Dylan performs a song (in waltz 3/4 tempo) that he had just written. It calls out to American youth to rebel, to ignore their parents and the politicians. A song of revolution. The Times they are A Changin’. Learn the song well for the course.

lyrics here 

Peter, Paul and Mary. A favorite of mine.

Dylan has his own summary of the sixties, recently released:

“Murder Most Foul” It was a dark day in Dallas, November ’63 A day that will live on in infamy President Kennedy was a-ridin’ high Good day to be livin’ and a good day to die Being led to the slaughter like a sacrificial lamb He said, “Wait a minute, boys, you know who I am?” “Of course we do, we know who you are!” Then they blew off his head while he was still in the car……

By 1961, Bob Dylan has moved to New York, is gaining a reputation as a songwriter and starting to become well known as a performer. Bob Dylan’s agent is Albert Grossman. He also manages Peter, Paul and Mary. They make Dylan famous.  Perhaps that’s why Grossman put them together. In late 1963 they are huge. Dylan will be soon. In the meantime, he is their prime songwriter.

Blowin’ in the Wind

Please pay close attention to the close vocal harmony!!!

Lyrics

So where did Dylan come from? He grew up as Robert Zimmerman, a Jewish kid in a small town in Minnesota. Dylan borrowed his name from someone else.

Who was Dylan Thomas?

He borrowed his musical persona from someone else, too – Woody Guthrie.

Early Dylan borrowed lyrics and music from other artists and cultures and created famous songs. Was he a cheat? Or was he just doing what folk musicians did?

Was Dylan a song thief?

Read more about what made Dylan Dylan.

My dialogue with Bob Dylan

Woody Guthrie, Dylan’s hero, was a more authentic folk/protest singer. Have a look  his famous song “This Land is Your Land” (see here on Wikipedia as well). What’s missing? In the Weaver’s popular recording, only the first three verses are sung. The subsequent ones are the disruptive ones (we’re talking about a song written in 1944, recorded in 1944). Learn the disruptive verses for the course.

Scroll down for lyrics:

Woody Guthrie singing “This land is your land”

Woody Guthrie is one of the leaders of the folk/protest movement. Others include Pete Seeger, Joan Baez, Tom Paxton, Buffy Ste. Marie. The music has:

Simple lyrics and melodies (sometimes ‘borrowed’).

A strong message, which can border on self-righteousness.

Here is Donovan‘s version of (Canadian!!) Buffy Ste. Marie‘s song, The Universal Soldier. It is a classic. Do you agree with it? Learn it for the course.

Here is Pete Seeger singing Tom Paxton’s song “What did you learn in school today“.

Here is the local version.

Joan Baez singing “Donna Donna” – do you know where the song came from?

In February, 1964, the Beatles appear on the Ed Sullivan show with 70 million viewers (me among them) and take the US by storm. Their Merseyside 2-4 rock ‘beat music’ is as  infectious than the Corona virus and will soon pervade folk and protest music.

So I think (and I am not alone) that Sixties (rock) music was born out of the collision between folk/protest and early rock. Here’s a prime example indicating what happened:

In early 1964 Dylan writes “Hey Mr. Tambourine Man“. He records it with the producer Tom Wilson. It has an acoustic folk feel. Pure genius.

Scroll down for lyrics:

Scroll down for lyrics:

Dylan singing Hey Mr. Tambourine Man at Newport Folk Festival in 1964

But when the Byrds got hold of it…. “In an attempt to make it sound more like The Beatles, the band … elected to give the song a full, electric rock band treatment, effectively creating the musical subgenre of folk rock. Dylan was impressed, enthusiastically commenting, “Wow, you can dance to that!”

So by the mid-sixties, with the Beatles everywhere, if you didn’t rock, you didn’t exist.

Another great example of a band that ‘succumbed’ to the British invasion is Simon and Garfunkel. They also have the same producer Tom Wilson  to thank (or not). Here’s the story, in the next book of the course.

Beatles and Dylan had collided. At first through the music, then in person. They rubbed off on one another. The Beatles would go on to write more introspective music. John would sing with a somewhat Dylanesque voice and approach. Dylan, for his own part went electric in 1965. Popular music would never be the same.

A little extra something: Here is an amazing recording of a very young Donovan performing a very young song in front of the slightly older Dylan, who (at Donovan’s own request?) shows him up. A very telling video. Someone commented that if Phil Ochs were there he would have shown them both up. Enjoy!