Draft lyrics to Bob Dylan’s ‘Mr. Tambourine Man’ sell for US$508K at auction

An image released by Julien's Auctions shows musician Bob Dylan's lyrics for famed song "Mr. Tamborine Man" are show in this undated image. (Julien's Auctions via AP)

NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Draft lyrics to Bob Dylan’s song “Mr. Tambourine Man” went for over a half-million dollars as part of a weekend sale of dozens of items related to the iconic American singer-songwriter.

About 60 Dylan items — including photos, music sheets, his guitar, pencil drawings and an oil painting composed by the Nobel Prize for literature winner — were sold on Saturday in Nashville, Tennessee, through Julien’s Auctions.

The items generated nearly $1.5 million in sales overall through in-person and online bidding, the auction house said. 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 typewritten lyrics, which covered three drafts of the 1965 song, were written 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 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 “Bringing It All Back Home” album 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 Saturday included a 1968 Dylan-signed oil-on-canvas painting for $260,000 and a custom 1983 Fender guitar that he owned and played for $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.

The Associated Press