Bob Dylan is a folk singer from the 60’s who drastically changed the music scene. Releasing his first album March 19, 1962, his debut was made possible by John Hammond from Columbia Records. Most of the album features covers of folk classics, but it does include two original songs: Talkin’ New York and Song to Woody, an ode to Woody Guthrie, one of Dylan’s original inspirations for his early career. When they first came out, they weren’t smash hits, but Hammond had faith in him even then.

With an estimated 125 million records sold, Bob Dylan has cemented his place as one of the best and most influential artists to ever have existed. Many people know him for his popular songs like Blowin’ in the Wind and Like a Rolling Stone, two songs that will go down in history for their effect on folk music as a whole. When he first played his song Like a Rolling Stone, a song about the downfall of a rich bourgeois woman, he played it at the Newport Folk festival. At the time, it was hugely controversial, as many saw the song as a complete diversion from folk, and said that rock-and-roll had no place there. Throughout his career, people have called his music many different things: folk, blues, rock, gospel, country, and even traditional pop. But Dylan never liked the idea that music needed labels in that way – that his music was a poem, and you could either listen to what he had to say or ignore him. He makes this quite clear in his autobiography, Chronicles Volume One. “I consider myself a poet first and a musician second. I live like a poet and I’ll die like a poet,” said Dylan.

The thing he was known for most during his time, however, was his political advocacy. His songs like Masters of War, Hurricane, and Only a Pawn in Their Game spoke volumes to the civil rights movement of the 60s and 70s, preaching about the lack of racial justice in the U.S. at the time. His music had a profound impact on many people, and as he brought up many times in Chronicles Volume One, it transcends the passage of time, somehow still relevant even to this day. “Songs are supposed to be heroic enough to give the illusion of stopping time,” said Dylan.