Bob Dylan in our Concert Repertoire

My name is Tanya Maas, and I am the choir director at Longhorn High School here in Longhorn, Massachusetts.  As many of the community members know, we will be performing our Fall Concert this November 22^nd, in our auditorium at 7pm.  On our repertoire list is a set of Bob Dylan pieces from his album Freewheelin’.  I have received many complaints from community members about this set being part of our concert, and I would like to explain my reasons for why we will still be performing them despite this.

I have been using this set to teach many different ideas to my students.  First and foremost, this music is viewed as folk music.  As the students have been learning, Kip Lornell quotes six conditions for determining American Folk Music:

1.      It is regional music

2.      It is a cultural and community influenced product

3.      It is composed with a culmination of ideas through a group, not an individual

4.      It is taught and learned by the people of the community; it is part of every day activity and passed on through cultural reference

5.      It is performed by non-professional musicians and created where there are no professionals

6.      It is built around short, predictable forms and patterns, and aims for this for individual expressions

When you compare Bob Dylan’s Freewheelin’ album to this criteria, it does not necessarily fit the bill; yet his music is revered as folk music.  The students have been researching this and working on finding how this can be, so they can better understand the music they are singing.

            Bob Dylan’s music was very much influenced by the community he lived in.  Born in Minnesota, he began to be immersed into the folk culture while still going to college at University of Minnesota.  He dropped out to move to New York, where his greatest idol, Woody Guthrie, was in a hospital.  While in New York visiting Guthrie, Dylan began going to folk clubs and meeting other folk musicians.  It was while playing in one of these clubs that a good review was written about him, which led to his getting signed to Columbia Records.  On his first album, all but two of his songs were folk music.  The community around him had shaped the music he played.

            On his next album, Freewheelin’, all but one song was an original song.  However, as the students have found through this set of music, it is still called folk music.  It is taught and learned by the community, as number four of Lornell’s list insists.  Everybody could learn the songs off this album, because they consisted of short, predictable forms and patterns, as number six states.  When Dylan performed his music, the audience sang along with him, because it was music that everybody knew and everybody learned.  He is one of the most covered artists of all time.  Peter, Paul and Mary, Elvis Presley, Bruce Springsteen, Adele, and countless other artists have sang one or more of his songs.  Many of his songs are actually more famous by other artists who covered it.  His music is universal, and because of this will continue to be popular for a long time.  It is because of these reasons that it is considered folk music, and is being sung at our concert.

            Another topic that I have been using this set to teach my students is protest music.  Although Bob Dylan claims his music was not written as protest music, the fact of the matter is, that’s exactly what it was used for during our country’s civil rights fights in the 1960s.  The country was in turmoil during this time.  Many activist groups, such as Martin Luther King Jr.’s Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), and the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), were coming into being and demanding equal rights for everybody.  Throughout the protests, marches, and sit-ins, Bob Dylan and his music, particularly from this album, were highly present.  He performed at the March on Washington D.C. in August 1963.  Many of his songs, like “Blowin’ in the Wind”, “When the Ship Comes In”, and “Only a Pawn in their Game” were used as nonviolent protest music at these gatherings, many times with himself performing them.  As the Civil Rights Movement is an extremely important part of our country’s history, it is important to use this music as a way of teaching about the movement to my students.

            In the end, I hope that the members of this community can see why singing a set from Bob Dylan’s Freewheelin’ album is both appropriate and acceptable for our Fall Concert.  Music can be used to teach many subjects, and that is exactly what I am using this music for.  Folk music is an extremely large genre of music that all students should be taught.  This music was also an important part of a huge chunk of our history.  Our students should learn about it in a variety of ways, including the music used during that time.  Throughout the preparation for this concert, my students have learned a great deal, and can’t wait to show you this at our Fall Concert on November 22^nd in our auditorium at 7pm.  I hope to see many community members there. Thank you.

Shostakovich's Symphony 11

The composer we studied this week was Dmitri Shostakovich, who wrote many works, including his Symphony 11, which was the specific work for this week.  Looking at the symphony through an historical lens of socialist realism creates an interesting, if not controversial, background to the piece.  Soviets wanted to use music for propaganda, so it needed to meet certain criteria: have a happy ending, be about and for the Common Man, use folk material, and above all, glorify the motherland.  After an article was written about Shostakovich’s opera Lady MacBeth of the Mtsenk District, (presumably by Stalin) it would be safe to think that Shostakovich would want to write something to please the government.  His Symphony 11 is based on the events of January of 1905, “The Eve of Bloody Sunday.” 

Knowing the historical background of the composer and his country creates a deeper connection to the symphony; however, it is not needed.  Shostakovich wrote in such a way that, when I listened to it the first time without any knowledge of the history, I still connected with the piece.  It was dark and real.  He used percussion in ways we have not heard in the works we’ve studied thus far.  The timpani sounded like a battle drum, or an execution march in the final movement.  Before learning about the piece, it sounded like a battle going on, then an execution march, followed by the quiet after death.  The piece is amazing before knowing the history behind it, and then it’s even more interesting after learning about the history.

This symphony follows the rules for what music was supposed to be like during the Soviet rule.  There are a plethora of Russian revolutionary songs used throughout the symphony.  “The Prisoner” is used in the first movement, starting at pickup to measure 16.  In the fourth movement, measure 140 has the song “Varshivianka” as its melody.  The symphony itself was written for the Common Man, with its use of these songs, and with the ease of listening to it.  It creates emotion within the listener, and was very well received.

This work has similarities to some of the other orchestral work we’ve studied thus far in the semester.  Shostakovich’s use of Russian revolutionary songs throughout the piece is similar to Stravinsky’s use of Russian folk songs throughout his Rite of Spring.  Both Symphony 11 and Copland’s Lincoln Portrait were written as nationalistic pieces, yet both have been looked at controversially for what their composers may have actually meant with the work; Copland for communist tendencies, and Shostakovich as not actually a nationalistic piece.

This piece, however, is a great example of the use of “place” that we have been discussing all semester long.  Knowledge of place behind the composer and piece gives more to the listener and studier.  After hearing about the conditions of Russia during the Soviets and Stalin ruling, I was able to understand better the underlying pain throughout the piece.  When we learned about the ultimate fear that Russians felt every day, including Shostakovich, it made me understand why he wrote such a nationalistic symphony, yet it could be argued that there are underlying tones not cohesive to the nationalistic outlook.  This is the same when you look at national governments and their influence on classical music.  Where composers are and what is happening in their world, greatly influences their music.  Copland is another example of this, like I talked about earlier.  When his work was supposed to be played at a president’s inauguration, the government stepped in and said that, because he may be communist friendly, his work should not be used for the event.  The government has the power to interfere with music just as much as everything else.  Roosevelt influenced music with the New Deal and WPA Music Program.  Much of the same thing happened in Soviet Russia, with Stalin being able to dictate the music and control the musicians through fear.