News Arena Network - New York - UPDATED: January 20, 2025, 01:09 PM - 2 min read
American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan. Image: X
Draft lyrics of the iconic song "Mr Tambourine Man" sold for a whopping half-million dollars as part of a weekend sale of dozens of objects related to legendary American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan.
Julien's Auctions sold over 60 Dylan objects on Saturday in Nashville, Tennessee, including photographs, music sheets, his guitar, pencil sketches, and an oil painting composed by the Nobel Prize for Literature winner.
Bob dylan in his apartment in New York, shot by Ted Russell, 1964. Image: X
The auction house reported that the objects fetched over USD 1.5 million in total sales through in-person and online bidding.
Julien's said 50 of the items, including the lyrics that received the highest sale price, came from the personal collection of late music journalist Al Aronowitz.
The lyrics, which covered three drafts of the 1965 song, were typewritten on two sheets of yellow paper, with Dylan's annotation on the third draft.
Dylan wrote the original draft lyrics in the journalist's New Jersey home, according to Julien's, citing a 1973 newspaper article by Aronowitz.
Dylan sat "with my portable typewriter at my white formica breakfast bar in a swirl of chain-lit cigaret smoke, his bony, long-nailed fingers tapping the words out" on copy paper, Aronowitz was quoted as writing.
The lyrics were typewritten on two sheets of yellow paper, with Dylan's annotation on the third draft.
The third draft, while close to the final version, still had significant variations from the final lyrics, the auction house said on its website.
The song appeared as the lead track on the acoustic side of his 1965 album "Bringing It All Back Home" and was the first Dylan composition to reach No. 1 in the United States and the United Kingdom, Julien's said.
Other high-selling items included a 1968 Dylan-signed oil-on-canvas painting for USD 260,000 and a custom 1983 Fender guitar that he owned and played for USD 225,000.
Dylan, now 83, is garnering attention with last month's release of the movie "A Complete Unknown", which focuses on his rise to stardom in the early 1960s.
Dylan is played by Timothée Chalamet, who has worked for several years on the role, which involves singing and playing guitar.
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