Did you see Bob Dylan in London's folk clubs in the early 60s? Were you one of the fans who shouted 'traitor'? Did you meet the man? Send your anecdotes, reminiscences and pictures (if you have any) to the email adress below, and we'll publish them on this site!

Send your Bob Dylan memories to: haveyouseenbob@bbc.co.uk

I was in Manchester during the infamous "Judas" tour , I discovered Bob Dylan I have you know, ...I didn't realise that everyone else was turned on to him... but , I couldn't afford a ticket to see him, so me and some friends hung out at the back of the venue, hoping to hear or see him, little did I know that my "friends " were more knowledgable/ streetwise than me, they saw Bob but only to score drugs for him, they ran about being very important, and supplied him with what he wanted, then we went back home and listened to him all night, again. I don't know how to describe my feelings."Judas?" he was mine, I was sharing him I was so near yet so far.. all I heard after was "he's wearing a shiny suit and playing electric guitar"but i remember listening to all his subsequent albums obsessivly and loving them, learning from them, I changed with him, isn't that what life is about? Thank you Bob.

Norma Scott

I saw the man in the 60's at a cinema in Birmingham! Hard to credit it but artists often played in cinemas years ago.... In fact I saw Leonard Cohen in 1980 at the same venue, which I think is now an Odeon Cinema. The great Zim played a part acoustic, part electric set. I was entranced by the whole thing - none of this mad folk v pop stuff for a real Dylan fan! We all just loved everything thing he did. A real quirky diifferent chiarismatic individual had come into our lives to stir us all up and give us a soundtrack to live by. I'm still going strong with the man. In moments of stress I'm know to lapse unconciously into Dylanese. Lost count of the number of poison headaches I've had. There was a bit if booing going on when the band appeared - weakly, back in the cinema - but this was soon overcome by cheers of support...I believe that Dylan went on to have a look at Whitley Court, a local ruin, after the gig I saw him at, and he is quoted in biographies as having seen a ghost there...I could barely speak from excitement for a week afterwards. His Bobness wore a black cord drainpipe suit and a pink gingham shirt and said only one thing. 'There's a bit of dirt on the stage..' Still got my programme - it was so long ago that band t shirts hadn't been invented!

Mary Worrall

I was a student at Salford Uni in 1966 and went to the Free Trade Hall concert with several friends. I was sitting high up in the Balcony well behind the guy who shouted Judas. My memory is that he either was sitting at the front of the Balcony, or went there to shout and then walked out - but it is a long time ago. The acoustic half was amazing, the atmosphere seemed electric!! I particularly remember the fantastic harmonica bits. The electric half seemed to me to be just a mush of very loud sound with vocals you could not hear. I only realised when we were leaving, and talking about what we had heard, that Bob had played "One too many Mornings" in the second half, I really had not recognised it or heard any of the words. I wouldn't have missed the first half for anything, but my lasting impression is that very few people there enjoyed the second half.

Peter Wood

The time: 40 years ago. The place: City Hall, Newcastle upon Tyne. The event: Bob Dylan. No warmup artists, no backup singers, no accompanying musicians, just Dylan, a guitar and harmonica. The only other item on stage was a stool on which perched a glass of water. 2 1/2 hours of a master doing what he does best. I still have the stub, which I keep along with another - this time the place was Atlanta, Georgia (my home for the past 20 years), the year was 2003, the venue was Phillips arena and I was in the front row! The music was rock rather than folk, but many of the songs were the same as those I'd first heard back in Newcastle. Different arrangements, fresh and exciting. Bob has been on a trip these last 40 plus years, and has taken many of along on a wonderful ride.

Mike Chalmers

I was at the Manchester Free Trade Hall concert of 1966. I'd first heard Dylan being played in the school hall at lunchtime (De La Salle College, Salford) the previous year-I was immediately attracted to the folk-blues sound of Man of Constant Sorrow-the voice, the guitar the harmonica-so bought the Bob Dylan album. Then bought the rest one by one till I was up to date: I loved everything he did and identified with his progression from folk/blues to his own unique style. Writing poetry myself I loved Dylan's use of words and enjoyed the move to rock which seemed musically more appropriate by the mid sixties. I was nearly 15 at the time of the FTH concert. Dylan was captivating in the first half. I remember the great shock of hair and the way he squirmed as he sang in a very intense way and the haunting wail of the harmonica. In the second half there were lots of people around us who were heckling-I remember "Judas!"-the cry seemed to come from not far away from us-we were in the first balcony about six rows back from the front. I was annoyed about the heckling and slow handclapping-they seemed to be jumping on the bandwaggon(most people would be aware of the other 66 tour concerts and the heckling and booing there-it was well-covered in the press). Quite a few people-20somethings-stormed out up the steps past us. They shouldn't have gone-by this time everyone knew of the elctric albums and the singles that had made the charts and were regularly played on Radio Caroline. The music was loud but to me it was fresh and exciting-a gret version of One Too Many Mornings and of course the finale of Thin man and Rolling Stone. I felt the Dylan had followed his muse and was being truer to himself by persevering with his new music-and I think that time has proved him right.

Christopher Carson

I first heard him singing Blowin in the Wind - it was playing on the radio in the chip shop where I stopped on the way back home after passing my driving test, and the words stopped me in my tracks. After that I wanted to hear everything of his and my favourite from back then, after Tambourine Man (I can still see the black and white film that they showed whilst it played on Top of the Pops) is still With God on our Side. We were all so convinced that our generation could stop wars and injustice for ever - how wrong can you be? My first trip as a qualified driver was in dad's old Ford Thames van to see Bob at the De Montfort Halls in Leicester in 1965. I loved the first half - Tambourine Man, the anthem of my generation, was never better before or since that night and, despite Maggie's Farm which I still hate with a passion to this day, I didn't boo for the electric set because I felt so ashamed of the rudeness of my countrymen in not letting him sing it like he felt it. Since then he seems to have sung my life - especially the songs on Time Out of Mind which I played over and over when I lost my hubby. I have no idea whether Bob will ever see this but, just in case, "Thankyou, Mr Zimmerman".

Di Wardle

I saw Bob Dylan at the City Hall, Newcastle on Thursday 6th May, 1965. One month before our A levels, Chalkie and I lashed out 12s 6d on a balcony ticket. My memories of the concert are atmospheric rather than vividly detailed, but Dylan performed solo and accompanied himself on acoustic guitar and harmonica. The lasting memory is of an unprepossessing man holding the entire audience spellbound by his own musical and narrative efforts. I think the PA broke down in the middle of the performance. During this hiatus, Bob just wandered around the stage, examining the organ at the back of the hall, totally unconcerned by events. He sang songs his early albums as well as from "Bringing It All Back Home", issued at around that time, but with solo arrangements. I have only the ticket stub and the memories - souvenir T-shirts and other memorabilia were yet to make an appearance at concerts. It was obvious then that this man was something very different to everything that had gone before.

Keith Duncan

I saw Bob Dylan at the Free Trade Hall Manchester concert in 1966.I was 16 and went with a friend from school. We had seats right at the front and I remember gazing up at him thinking a) how slight he was b)how curly his hair was and c)how brilliant the music was! The acoustic first half was as expected-wonderful, but I seem to remember the second half as being just as good too.I remember the "Judas" taunt coming from somewhere up on the balcony behind us and the Band playing with the lights on at some point.Strangely though, I dont remember the evening degenerating into angry chaos or anything like it really. I just have memories of a great night out with a bit of heckling.

Maggie Freed

The first time I saw Bob Dylan perform in the UK was when he came over for "The Madhouse on Castle Street". I was already familiar with the eponymous first LP, which I had borrowed from a later-to-become-famous friend and copied on my reel-to-reel recorder. I was at a room-over-a-pub Folk Club at the "King and Queen", Foley Street.W.1. where "The Thameside Four" featuring Martin Carthy had a residency. During the evening Bob Dylan, Dave Van Ronk and Dick Farina came in. For some reason they only did one number - a rollicking version of Sleepy John Estes' "Floating Bridge" with Dylan on harmonica. The next night Carolyn Hester and Dick Farina were playing The Troubadour - I stayed until the place closed but Bob and Dave didn't show. The next time I saw Bob he was playing at the Royal Festival Hall. This was just after the "Freewheelin'" had been released in the U.K. I am not sure if this was a one-off concert, it was certainly the only date he did in London. A fantastic experience - Dylan, almost dwarfed by his Gibson, singing, strumming and blowing harp under a single spotlight. On the next tour I saw both the Albert Hall concerts. Some might say that they were both the same. I thought they were totally different. The songs were the same on both nights - there was one encore both nights, and that was the same song. Dylan never spoke until he came back onto the stage for the encore. "The name of this song is, 'If you gotta go, go now, or else you gotta stay all night.'" I wanted to stay all night but I had to go. I have a friend who saw two shows on two consecutive nights when he was studying in Melbourne, Australia. This was the same tour as the Albert Hall shows I have referred to in the previous paragraph. It would seem that my friend saw two shows that were identical to the two that I saw. But we both agree that to us they were both completely different. I missed the 1966 tour as I was unable to get tickets. So I'll never know what, if anything, I'd have shouted. Probably something like "Shut up you reactionary t***s!" directed at the hecklers. Dylan has changed, his music has changed, and I too have changed. Some sweet flowers change into foul-smelling weeds. I truly believe that I have changed for the better. So I must thank the poets and the innovators like Bob Dylan, Miles Davis and othes too numerous to mention.. They taught me to laugh, they taught me to cry, they taught me to ask questions, they taught me to think, they taught me to believe. "May you stay forever young."

Richard White

I saw Bob Dylan at the Odeon Birmingham on Thursday May 12th 1966, with my cousin Robert Dalby. The first half of the show consisted of Bob doing his folk thing and everything went fine. However as soon as the second half started, with Bob playing electric, there was plenty of objections from some of the audience. One man got up and shouted. "Get the group off the stage, we want Bob to play folk". Immediately the man in front of him jumped up and tried to punch him in the face. There followed several small fights and arguments between the folk fans and the Bob Dylan fans. This mayhem went on for most of the rest of the concert. As far as I and my cousin were concerned, we were Dylan fans and if he wanted to play electric, that was fine by us. It was a concert never to be forgotten and I am sure that it was recorded because a large tape recorder was visible at the edge of the stage. However I have never heard of any recording been made available from that show, although recordings from other concerts on that British tour have I believe been issued in the past.

Les Kirkland

I was a 18 year old teenager who took time off work to queue for two tickets to see Bob.I first his songs via a Joan Baez album called Farewell Angellina, which sort of opened a door in my mind and made me think about social issues,relationships,and all manner of things not addressed by pop songs of the day.I bribed a mate of mine called Bob Kelly to come with me to the Odeon in Liverpool.The first half Bob opened with She Belongs To Me and then played a acoustic set.The second half he opened up playing the piano backed by a incredible sounding band. It was the first time the hairs on my neck stood up and a strange sensation over came me. There was a few shouts from the audience which sounded somethink like messiah and a group people walked out. I was dumb founded this was the best concert I had been to. After the concert we went back to our local pub and I put on Bob Dylans songs all night, much to the annoyance of all at the pub. I have since been a great fan of Bob and his music ,and seen him on nearly all his visits to the UK.

Tommy Giblin

Although I saw both Bob Dylan 1966 Albert Hall concerts, and have an abiding memory of the whole drama of it all, the thing that sticks most in my mind is the fact that I got in both nights for free. The first night my then mate and I turned up outside the Albert Hall with only our bus fares home. We could just hear 'Times they are aChanging' echoing momentously in the distance, signifying the start of the performance, when a well heeled mink stoled, suited and tied middle-aged couple suddenly emerged from a central doorway and gave their tickets to us as the lady was 'not feeling well'. Legally and smugly ticketed we strode past the large doormen and eventually found ourselves right by the stage in the midst of some very 'well-off' VIP type people. I sat my grubby jeans down next to a very smart lady whom I'm sure was Alma Cogan. A darkened audience and one spotlight on the figure on stage. The next night we turned up again in our usual skint state but didn't have the same luck, and ended up, on a count of three, running headlong past a group of startled doormen.We belted up stairs and down corridors, eventually losing the pursuing officials in the throng. We watched the concert (still smug) from a very high balcony with no seats. Still the same darkened audience, solitary spot and incredibly dramatic tension. I also had a summer job in the BBC at Lime Grove in the mid-sixties. I spent six weeks or so in a deep basement filing piles of contracts for artists who either worked, or sought to work, on the BBC. I came across the file with all the correspondance between Albert Grossman and the BBC relating to Bob Dylan's two ( I think it was two) performances on 'Tonight'. Grossman drove a hard bargain for the poor old Beeb, saying that although his artist preferred to appear on the BBC, the public national network, unless they came up with more money he would be forced to accept the much more lucrative offer from ITV. It was a glimpse into other worlds. In the west London streets surrounding Lime Grove our parents' depended on tight budgets, pacts made in churches and gratitude that they had survived something they called the Blitz....... I've seen Bob Dylan a few times in the ensuing decades. Although I must have paid some entrance fees since, I've still tried to get in by just turning up on the night (apart from once in Frankfurt when we drove for hours down autobahns to let our young children hear a live Mr Dylan. They must have exhausted themselves leaping around to Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, because they both fell asleep shortly after Bob Dylan came on). It was really good to start off seeing it all by jumping those barriers. Like the music does.

Anonymous

I saw Dylan in Cardiff in 1965 or 1966 and he sang the following songs :- She Belongs To Me I Don’t Believe You It’s All Over Now Baby Blue Mr Tambourine Man Like A Rolling Stone Baby Let Me Follow You Down Ballad Of A Thin Man Just Like Tom Thumb’s Blues Desolation Row One Too Many Mornings Leopard Skin Pill Box Hat Just Like A Woman Fourth Time Around Mama You’ve Been On My Mind About the only time he spoke was when he introduced a track and said my next song is entitled “I see you’ve got a brand new leopard skin pillbox hat“ Someone shouted out “God “ when he first came on stage.

Tony Lockyer

I have recently written to the Daily Mail in response to the question - "Has the person who shouted out "Judas" at a Bob Dylan concert in Manchester on May 17th 1966 ever been indentified?" to confirm that this was in fact my Father, Stuart Crewe. I do not doubt that many people have laid claim to the title of the 'Dylan heckler" and indeed that this e-mail seems like another such attempt. I have even heard of a particular Canadian gentleman stating that he was in fact the heckler. However, for as long as I can remember my father has told me the story of how he, as a 19 year old eager fan, and his then girlfriend, June, hitch hiked to the Manchester Free Trade Hall on May 17th to see the man himself. During the concert, My father, who had been at the very back of the hall for much of the time, had become frustrated at Dylan apparently "selling out"; becoming more rock and roll in order to sell records, rather than remaining true to his folk origins, playing his harmonica and acoustic guitar. Therefore, making his way to the front of the hall in order to leave in protest, he shouted the now infamous line "Judas" and received the response "I don't believe you" and "You're a liar". I watched the recent Bob Dyaln documentaries with great anticipation of seeing this event and was not disappointed. Whilst I now wear my Father's t-shirt from the tour, bearing the logo 'Here lies Bob Dylan - passed away Royal Albert Hall, May 1966 R.I.P" in protest of Dylan's use of electric guitars, my only upset is that I have no proof of this claim, other than the confirmation of those who were there at the time. My father is proud of his 'claim to fame' and has been the object of much intrigue this week at work, but to be honest is now tired of telling the same story for the past 40 years!!

Stephanie Crewe

There was no queuing all night, no long journey to Birmingham, no hoping that he would stick to the folk songs and leave out the electric stuff. I didn't know enough about music or Bob Dylan to realise how lucky I was to be seeing him live. Some school friends who knew that I had liked 'With God on Our Side' and 'It Ain't me Babe' , had a spare ticket for the concert at The Odeon, Birmingham. It was only a bus ride away. Would I like to come? At seventeen, I had never been to a live music concert, had no idea what Dylan looked like and even less idea about the controversy Dylan had started by breaking out of the narrow confines of the folk tradition. It was just a good night out with some friends - a life-changing night out, as it turned out. Not realising that this would be the most-memorable- ever concert for me and that the whole tour would live in the collective consciousness of my generation for decades, I was more concerned about what I was going to wear than what Dylan would sing. All that changed when he walked on to the stage, a diminutive figure with a great big guitar and a great big voice and strangely fascinating pronunciation. The lights lit his halo of hair; the harmonica stretched sounds almost beyond what was bearable and poetic, half-understood words and images mainlined their meanings straight to my soul. Throughout the first half, the audience sat in reverent, concentrated silence. It was entrancing. I have no memory of the interval, but I will never ever forget the second half. The electric music was great - a huge enveloping sound, far more exciting than any rock music that I had heard listening underneath the blankets to Radio Luxemburg in the small hours of the morning. It was loud, it was rude and I loved it. Although Dylan was not like anyone else on the music scene at the time, there was a funny feeling of familiarity, as though Dylan had discovered his music rather than invented it, which in a way, perhaps he had. I couldn't understand the hecklers. Why had they come? Why didn't they just go home? Why were they trying to spoil the concert? I think that Dylan got better and better after that. His creativity has waxed and waned from time to time but the Time Out of Mind album is as good as anything he wrote when he was young. See you at the NEC in November, Bob! (Oh and thank you Ingrid & Claire who got me the ticket!)

Phillipa Partington

Christopher Malden must be seven feet six, or have very dodgey lamps! Dylan is five eleven- six two in boots! When I saw him at The Hall in 66, he was BRILLIANT!! The electric set was spoilt somewhat by a wally jumpered twit in front of me who was shouting stuff about some geezer called Woodie Guthridge.I responded to this by poking him in the back of his head with my right index finger, until he stopped-very council house of me I know, even worse, now hang onto your mortgage, I then wrote, you are a twit, or words to that effect, on his Candice-Marie type sweater! ALL HAIL THE MIGHTY DYLAN!!!

Billy King

My memories of Bob Dylan are connected with my years at college in Huddersfield. There were three of us in the house but Barbara aquired only two tickets to see Bob in Sheffield in 1966. The right two won the draw out of the hat for them as we were the real Dylan fans (writing out the words in order to analyse them!). The excitement ot travelling by train to see him live was great. The real Dylan memories of him were Barbara having recorded Bringing it all back home onto a cassette tape. I came back from a weekend away before she did and could not resist the temptation to borrow her precious tape and player but, horror!, the tape jammed and unwound all over the floor, Guilty as charged, I was busy rewinding it all back with a Bic pen when who should walk up the drive? Yes, Barbara who was wearing MY prize possession, a very hard-earned brown leather jacket which was my pride and joy. So, all was evened out as our guilty looks matched each other's perfectly.

Linda Gresham

I went to Glasgow in 1966 with three friends from Leeds School of Architecture. We were walking along a street when a lad on a balcony looked down and shouted “Hiya fellas” and waved, there was a sound man and a camera man filming his every move. We waved back and went round the corner. Ian said, I think that was Bob Dylan (he was a much bigger Dylan fan than any of us, but we were getting there with constant listening). We thought he was joking but went back to see if he was still there. He had gone back in. We carried on and roung the next corner we saw the Empire, Bob Dylan, Tonight! Sold Out! I waited 30 years to see him again in Manchester.

Gordon Hindle

Electric music wasn’t unfamiliar. There was the whole array of early ‘60s pop and Tamla Motown running parallel to the early Beatles. As a schoolboy in ‘63 I’d been spending every Sunday night in a back room of the Station Hotel, Richmond, with the wonderful rhythm ‘n blues outfit, The Rolling Stones. It was within this mix that folk music became popular, primarily through Dylan, so, for many of us, it wasn’t an either/or preference. But the folk music scene did stand for something quite distinctive in its anti-establishment ethos and also because it brought, again primarily through Dylan, an intense focus to the lyrics. These were the years when people had their ears up against the speakers of their record-players as they scribbled out the words to the songs. When he came to the Royal Festival Hall in ‘64 for his first concert performances here, Dylan was a real performer, not just a singer. The songs were often deadly serious, about lynchings, murder and war, but he was extremely funny between songs. In those days he talked. There were amusing anecdotes told with a cheeky grin and comedic timing. He was a physical comedian, too, managing to create humour out of the minimal props of a barstool with a glass of water and a selection of harmonicas he'd fit into their holder as the songs required. It was a great concert. We heard many songs then unreleased like ‘Gates of Eden’, and an anthemic ‘Chimes of Freedom’ flashing far beyond the version that would come out on record. The following year, as a seventeen year old, I was off ‘on the road’ (the Beat equivalent of the 18th Century Grand Tour) hitch-hiking across Europe, Morocco and Sweden so Dylan’s ‘65 tour passed me by as I slept under the bridges of Paris. I had to make do with the ‘Don’t Look Back’ documentary for that one. In ‘66 I was at the first night of the Royal Albert Hall concerts (the tickets had gone so fast a further concert had been added for the following day). If the ‘64 concert was great it is hard to find words for what ‘66 was like. Dylan had ratcheted up the game so high it was stratospheric. You needed oxygen to be up there. The electric set caused the riots but in the acoustic first half he performed his songs so exquisitely they would have melted the vinyl off their recorded versions. He completely inhabited every word, every breath, every chord, every harmonica curlicue. And it all melded into magic. You almost stopped breathing to hear every nuance as it came across the air of that huge hall like a stream of glistening, glimmering jewels. We had never heard the songs like that before. You only have to hear, for instance, the Manchester version of ‘It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue’, an Antarctica of the soul to which the original recording cannot compare. Dylan’s muse was at white heat. Nobody could touch him; nobody was anywhere near. It wasn’t about him playing electric, Dylan himself was electric. He was a lightning rod for the Zeitgeist and the times they were a changing so fast by then they were becoming liquid, like mercury on a chess board. The first half had been better than I could ever have imagined. The second half kicked off a riot. It was like a battlefield of music. As the band blasted out it was pure exhilaration, like being plugged into the National Grid. Dylan swirled on the stage, with one hand waving free, looking like some kind of Aztec acid god, or a Byronic figure on a mountaintop, whipped by the wind, railing against the storm, shaking his fist at the heavens. By this time we’d seen all kinds of rock music and high energy performers. But this was something different. It was in a different dimension entirely. It was like Dylan was laying his life on the line. Not because he was alienating half his audience (that was trivial) but because he was punching through the envelope of Reality. It was pure science fiction. I have never seen anything like it. I couldn’t believe he could continue to exist on that stage. He was pushing beyond what is allowed to the human. This was hubris. He was challenging the gods. Every moment, I expected he would either levitate into an Ascension or be completely annihilated. What I had seen that night was as far as it could go; there wasn’t any further without blasting out of life completely, and the only thing out there is death. Dylan took it as high as anyone has ever taken it. It couldn’t go on. If he hadn’t have had his motorcycle accident he would be dead. People talk of those ‘66 concerts as historic and say they changed the face of music forever, but that’s not really it. It did have a historic dimension. There was probably no other time there was such a direct confrontation between an artist and (half of) his passionate audience. It was so intense because they felt betrayed (and betrayal is what you feel when your values are violated; it doesn’t come just from not liking someone’s music). Dylan had meant so much to so many. Dylan’s work did have a tremendous influence on the music of that time but that was not through the concerts, it was through the recordings. Although the concerts were packed out (at least for the first half) there were a limited number of people there and news from the front only seeped out slowly. It was years later before the bootleg of the second half of the Manchester concert, decades later before the full concert’s official release, years again until the concert film footage in the Scorsese documentary (‘Eat the Document’ had mere glimpses of the concert footage). It has taken 39 years for the full majesty of those performances to be seen by others and, even then, they missed seeing it live, within the quicksilver Zeitgeist of its time and all of it intensely compressed into a concert that passed by in less time than it takes to watch Scorsese’s documentary but has proven, for many who were there, to be timeless. What made it special was none of that rational stuff but that it was transcendent; it went beyond music, beyond performance, beyond everything you could imagine. It was in another realm entirely. The only words you could reach for would be from the lexicon of the mystic and the magical. It was not of this world.

Graham Dawes

We saw Bob in Liverpool in 1965 it was my husbands birthday the day of the concert so I queded up for a couple of hours to get tickets just as I got to be second in line they came out and said "anyone need just 2 tickets???"I said yes and got the last 2 tickets to the show and they were in the third row at the end great seats,The show was fabulous Dylan walked on the stage alone started singing right away and never stopped for an hour solid then just walked off no recalls that was it brilliant night.

Margaret Houghton

Like many I was very disappointed when I saw Dylan in Newcastle in 1966 but for me it was nothing to do with electrical amplification and everything to do with his clothes. A suit? A SUIT????!!!!!! Nobody cool wears suits. It was a bitter moment. Being a polite young teenager I was mortified when people booed and walked out of the second half. I had no idea what was going on - thought they were a) extremely rude and b) had just missed an extremely good band. And this is what should be said more. There were probably 80, 90% of us thought the whole of the second half was absolutely brilliant. Those songs I had never heard before had me in tears.

Jo Parlar (Well, I was Marjorie then. I'm cooler now.)

I went to the ’66 Birmingham concert. When he first came on, he sort of stalked around the microphone for a while before stooping down and running his fingers along a bit of the stage. Standing up again, he came up to the mike and said, “Dirt.” A little while later he added, “Dirt on the stage.” Quite matter-of-fact ; later I wondered if he wasn’t speaking metaphorically in the self-portrait mode. The first half was an enthralling acoustic set, and everyone behaved and adulated appropriately. The second half, he came on with his band, which went down like redrag in a bull’s gullet, and amidst the booing and growling, lots walked out. Round about then, I was shown up something severe by a huge bellow from Bear, one of the friends I’d come with and who doom would have it was sitting right next to me. “I’m still here, Bob !” he blasted, and I just cringed. After the first song of the electric set, Dylan seemed to have got the message, because the curtain went down on the raucous muscians, and there was Bob on his own again, except for a Val Doonican stool and a mike. He ambled folksily over to the mike and said something like : “I’m going to sing you a song my grandpappy taught me.” Applause. “And he got it from his grandpappy.” More applause. And he started to play his trusty-old and thoroughly PC acoustic guitar. Then, after just enough chords to fool us all, the air was rent by the electric screams of the Band, the curtain started withdrawing, and there they all were again, like shameless hysterical Muppets.

Anthony Faulkner

I went to see Dylan in 1965 at the Town Hall in Birmingham. It was such a wonderful experience and I dont think I realised at the time how important it would become for me. I since went to see him at the Odeon in Birmingham in 1966 and I remember waiting outside for the concert to start - it was late. My main memory from that second concert was seeing a stage with so much equipment on it - a stark contrast to the man, his guitar, a harmonica and glass of water! I was one of the people who walked out of the concert before the end. Apart from this I am still a fan of Dylan 40 years on and although I have not been to see him live since the 60s he will always be part of my musical heritage.

Jenny Sills

Yup in the sixties at Birmingham I was one of the people who left after the first half. I was so disappointed at the "group" behind him just became another group. I was at uni at the time and had spent most of my grant on a seat I was so upset I could have cried. I went to see him at the NEC when he appeared with Van Morrison only a few years ago really enjoyed it. Have since learned to appreciate what he did was a young hothead then Am a teacher who now tells students about the 60's and what it meant. Have spent many nights at Uni singing with God on my side and She belongs to me!!!! Long live Dylan with acoustic!!!

Valerie Lewis

I had seen Alexis Korner,the week before, he had told the story of the Blues. I had enjoyed that, so got a ticket for the next weeks show. It was Bob of course. I was 15 and green, the first half, Bob, doing his acoustic numbers, I had been expecting, but I, d never heard anything louder than a radio before so Bob and the Band, just blew me away. By the finish Bob was bouncing like a spring on stage. I think he enjoyed it. I did. I, v been a fan ever since.

Peter McCann

seen the great man in belfast ritz cinema in 1966 only 14 at the time so i dont remember a lot about it but i do remember the first half of the show was accustic and the second half the fabolus BAND backed him he opened the second half with like a rolling stone which i can remember living in belfast at the time where no big stars came to seeing dylan live on stage was very sureal, the old ritz cinema is long gone but dylan and his music will live for ever

Robert Carley

I first saw BD at RFH, May 1964, having driven (yes, one of the guys had a van - very unusual) down from Cambridge with two 3rd Years. I was a folkie, had never heard Dylan, was utterly gobsmacked by the richness and complexity of his songs, his singing as strong, thin and inevitable as a steel tightrope disappearing into the distance, that you knew if you stayed with it, on it, (the songs were so long!) would take you somewhere you (anybody?) had never been before, the harmonica decoration, filigree, places of comfort on the way. Stunning. Stunned. Next day bought Freewheelin and Times - the first and second LP's I ever bought. I had no record player at college, so had to wait for the vacation to play them - they spent the summer circulating round our LP share group (easily outscoring Joan Baez and Caroline Hester in popularity). By September I could do a passable clawhammer, so at the folk club did 'Don't think twice', aimed reproachfully at the girls, and a noisy strummed 'Hard Rains', staring accusingly at the older members. However my credibility as a Dylan clone wasn't helped by my wearing a waiter's jacket (liberated after a stint at the holiday camp) dyed (woefully inadequately) brown, in imitation of BD's suede jacket. Then it was back to university, where my LPs (still no record player) spent the term prominently displayed on my ground floor room's mantelshelf, curtains open, so I could smile quietly when passersby said, 'wow, two Bob Dylan records'. And I still buy each record as it comes out, and have a ticket for Manchester.

Keith Walton

My recollection of the Albert Hall concerts in '65 & '66 were amazing. In '65 I sat in stunned silence listening to every word of his songs, I knew them backwards anyway!! In 1966 I was just pregnant with my first child (she has always liked Bob Dylan) and again was amazed by his brilliance, I remember the 2nd half when people were getting up and leaving making very loud noises with their seats, which I found incredibly rude & ignorant. I moved closer to the stage and yes I agree the sound was not terribly good but oh what joy when he sang 'Maggie's Farm' and '116th Dream'.....I hope those that left will now regret their actions, as for me I am just grateful for the experience of seeing the beginning of a legend and being able to relay my memories to my kids and granddaughter. My son is also named after the Bob Dylan album - John-Wesley Harding.

Christine Fisher

We were sitting on the stage to the left 20 feet away from him at the DeMontfort Hall in Leicester in 1966. When he walked on into the dark auditorium lit with a single blueish spotlight he delivered what I always think was a performance equal to or better than the one at the Albert Hall. Maybe it was his rehersal for it. It was rock solid, powerful, concentrated and totally compelling. He was alert and delivered the goods in two parts both of which were distilled and tight. There seemed to me not one second where anyones concentration waivered. He stood at the microphone, hardly moved his body except I seem to remember did the first half mostly on one foot. The other cuban heeled booted foot moving behind his ankle in some strange twisting physical cramp.He was wearing the skin tight jeans and skinny jacket. The whole performance was an experience that made us sit still and quiet.From the stage the sound was so alive you could hear the squeaks of the chord changes on the guitar strings.I dont remember much movement from anyone except after each song a solid and loud applause.Not that he seemed to take any notice of the audience at all. I dont remember him actually saying anything. I've since thought that maybe by '66 he had switched off from audiences,stayed locked inside in himself,really got a grip of his work and let the performance speak for him. A few times he took a break hit the harmonica on his hand to get the spit out of it, tuned the odd string and fiddled with the holder to get it in the right place but all this was done as if it were a private thing that he was doing at home or in the studio. I dont remember a murmur form the audience when the electric second half started but on the stage it was like a crack of thunder.A wall music erupted.Songs like of Ballad of a thin man was burned into my memory and is still there. Some of the words of the songs were delivered softly and others he almost spat out venom like viz... Do you mr. jones ? If we were stilled by the first half at the end of the second we were somewhere else. Making sense of the obscurity of the words of some songs was pretty difficult if not impossible for a seventeen year old but I've stuck with it! It seems to me Im still finding out what some of the songs are really about years later.The obscurity however in itself was thrilling and took us light years away from the mush of show biz goo and the sillier pop songs.We could relate to the obscurity I suppose more than some of the content but even if you could'nt articulate what his songs were about you were taken to a different place. He had enriched and maybe even heightened the consiousness and the world of a 17 year old beyond belief. I had been given a ticket by David Bawden a schoolmaster friend who was afterwards forever sainted by me and with who I played guitar with in a folk group. And quite good we were too.Th Leicester music scene was quite enlightened even then. At 17 I was not really up to going and buying the ticket to go myself but one of my teachers friends could not go to the concert so he suggested giving the ticket to me....Thank you God.

John Kerr

I hitch hiked to Leicester with a group of friends and it took all day, and much walking, to get there. I arrived exhausted. I was fifteen and had entrusted my money to an even younger boy, Nigel, whose aunt in Leicester would buy tickets.When we got there there were no tickets - and no Nigel, either. I was offered, and bought, a ticket for its face value of 15 shillings (75 pence) and sat in seat L1 next to the man from whom I'd bought it. My four recollections of the concert are :- 1. It started with "She belongs to me." 2. I went to sleep during my all time favourite song "Desolation Row." 3.He sang "Just like a woman" which I'd never heard before. 4. It was fantastic. The journey home took three hours (the next morning.) I've still got the ticket and I've never seen Nigel again.

Ken Mayle

I well remember seeing Bob Dylan at the Odeon Cinema in New Street, Birmingham in 1966. I was almost 16 at the time and I'd had to queue for tickets all night with some friends a few weeks previously on a rather cold night but it was well worth it. At that time, Bob had no equal in what he was doing musically. The Acoustic First Half of the show was quite superb - as we'd all expected it would be. The Second Half was different (?) and Bob got a rather mixed response from the audience to say the least. However, I must say that up to and including 'Blonde on Blonde' (one of the great great albums of all time), I loved just about anything and everything from Bob Dylan and really couldn't get enough of his stuff. After Blonde on Blonde, there really hasn't been that much music from Bob Dylan that has made any lasting impression on me or got to me in the way that his early 60's music did. Maybe he just ran out of ideas and inspiration!!

John Didsbury

I saw Dylan at the De Montfort Hall, Leicester, in 1965. The main thing I remember was him doing Mr. Tambourine Man, which most of the audience hadn't heard before. Just Bob, his guitar and harmonica singing a song of such beauty and poetry. When he finished there was a silence that seemed to go on forever, everyone was just dumbfounded. Then the applause broke out. I've never known a moment like it since. I think that's why people were so against him going electric, not because it was bad but because it couldn't approach the dynamism of the man by himself. But then, everyone wants to be a rockstar. Also, hearing him first the year before made me go and buy a guitar, play round the clubs for years, where I met my wife, and name my second son Joey after the song on Desire. He's been such a huge influence on me and many people I know.

Pete Spencer

I saw Dylan at the Gaumont in Sheffield on 16th May 1966 (yes not I was surprised it wasn't at the City Hall). It was the perfect pick-me-up having seen Sheffield Wednesday lose the Cup Final to Everton 2 days before! I was nearly 18 at the time, about to sit my 'A' levels and I went with my school friend Lionel (who'd introduced me to Dylan), a girl called Cynthia and (I think) her friend (my girlfriend at the time, Wendy, was a bit miffed about that!). We were all in favour Dylan's electric sound. Of course we knew all about the fuss and we sat through the acoustic set in great anticipation. My memories are of a great harmonica solo during 'Mr Tambourine Man' and the sheer volume of the electric set. It must have been the loudest rock music ever played at that time. And it was great! The audience were split pretty much 50-50 and after each song the booers and cheerers would try and out do each other. I remember turning around and arguing with some people behind us who were heckling him. My only regret is that I didn't take too much notice of the musicians - you couldn't take your eyes of Bob for a minute. I later became a big fan of The Band and rank their "brown" album as one of the top 5 albums of all time.

Michael Glaves

I went to I thnk the 1966 concert at the Liverpool Empire with my then girlfriend. I was 19. I remember there being an exchange similar to the "Judas" incident at Manchester. I couldn't hear clearly because it was at the far side of the theatre, but somebody in the audience called "Where's the Messiah, Bob?" or words to that effect and Bob laughed and called back to the general audience "There's some guy here looking for the Messiah", to laughter. I've never seen that incident referred to anywhere and I sometimes wonder whether I've made it up. There was certainly general unrest and walking out during the second half, but I'm pleased to say we stayed put and got our money's worth.

Bill Green

Although only 11 years old in 1966 I had already wolfed down everthing Bob had to offer. I couldn't believe it when I found out he was going to play the Usher Hall in Edinburgh, until that point familiar to me only as the place where our annual school concerts took place. Alas, my devout Roman Catholic father would not hear of me attending such a devilish event. Disconsolate, on the day of the concert I was determined to get an autograph, not realising at that young age how Dylan would have scorned such a request. The concert was scheduled to start at 7.30 p.m. It seemd likely to my young mind that Dylan himself would probably arrive at the venue around 7.20, a little bit early to give himself a chance to take a pee before going onstage. Once more alas as I was expressly forbidden to leave the house after teatime as I had to take care of my baby brother Kenneth, four years old and still in nappies. Next day, still hurting inside at my loss, I was on an errand in the town centre when my ear was drawn to an American voice. He seemed to be shouting in my direction. 'Over here, this one!' I realised he was talking to someone walking behind me. I was overtaken by a gaunt, crow-like figure. He followed the first figure into a shop, a kilt hire specialist, one of many on the High Street in Edinburgh. It couldn't be! It was! Bob (and now I reckon it was Bob Neuwirth) were doing the whole tourist thing and having their photos taken in kilts. Spotting me in the corner of the store trying to look unobtrusive sizing up the sporrans, Bob called over. 'Hey, kid! Are you Scotch?' I replied that I was indeed Scottish. 'Which is better - the red or the green?' He was holding up two kilts for my opinion. No doubt feeling usurped as Bob's confidant, Neuwirth answered for me. 'Definitely the green, man. The red's like too much.' Both disappeared behind a curtain into the changing room and after much schoolgirlish giggling reemerged minutes later in full highland gear, the effect somwhat spoiled by Bob having neglected to take off his Cuban-heeled boots. 'Hey kid, get in the picture!' Bob generously made a space between me and Neuwirth as the shop owner took a hasty polaroid. 'Here,' said Bob, here's a souvenir of a big American rock star.' He handed me the snap as it developed before my eyes. This was a whole lot better than an autograph! My joy was short-lived, however. 'Bobby, I'd really like this one.' It was Neuwirth. He grabbed the picture from my hand as Bob went back into the changing room. Neuwirth hung back. 'Okay, kid, Bob's had enough now. No need to stick around.' I was ushered from the premises. I didn't mind. I had spoken to the great man himself and he had acknowledged my presence. I often wonder what happened to that photograph. Bob, if you're reading this, you made a poor wee Scotch boy very happy and when you play Glasgow this year, let's see you again in a kilt! (But lose the boots this time.)

Justin Master

Just sitting in an office in Trinidad, training people and wishing I could be watching arena. Being a football fan, in those days if Liverpool were far away (London lets say!!) I went to Goodson for the crack with mates... beer / match / beer... clubs / girls etc. What I remember most was in 1965 I missed Liverpool at Wembley to see bob on the Liverpool Empire, then in 66 Everton got to cup final and again I chose bob at the Odeon Liverpool. Best of the 66 was front row seats courtesy of usherette Sandra Morton, who we knew and so just sat in awe and listened. Not hearing the cries from the coffee bar freaks of Rodney Street. Just knowing and singing along to the words of every song, as we had learnt every song just like poetry. Wondering why beauty parlours were full of sailors. It was good to be a part of all the music, West Indian ski in toted, Yankee music off the canard boats and having spent lunch hours in the cavern, seeing most of the Mersey beat crew, knowing at least some of them from pool collegiate then as Mersey beat exploded seeing all the others in their early days Stones / Who / Kinks etc...But it was always special waiting for bobs next release, then seeing those 2 shows and golden memories of those black and TV shows that Bob had appeared on and wishing I could get to use to see 4th street or Hibbing.

John Rooke

When I was 15, I went to Glasgow on the train with a friend (Alastair) and his older brother, Bill, who wanted to check out clothes at the long and tall shop. All the way there Bill drove us crazy by singing “Maggie’s Farm.” All the way back home, we all sang it. Next day I went to the local record store and bought the “Bringing it all back home” album. The gal who sold it to me played a couple of tracks and said that she didn’t know how I could listen to that stuff: She’s now my wife of 32 years! She still “tolerates” it. I went to see Bob Dylan the following year (1966) at the Usher Hall in Edinburgh. That was where he did his acoustic set then plugged in and let it rip. Man, it blew me away!! I traveled to the Isle of Wight to see him again in 1999 which was quite an experience. Since then I’ve only seen him one more time and that was at the Orange County fair in California in 2003. Still blew me away! He IS the man!

George Moffat

I went to see Bob at Sheffield Civic Hall sometime in the 60's. It was his first gig, I think, during the 'Don't Look Back' tour. I went with my, then, girlfriend and another couple and sat on the front or second row. We could see Joan Baez looking through a screen in the wings. He walked on stage by himself and, without any preamble, launched into his set. He had harmonicas all over the stage and picked a different one for each song. He sang same classic songs from early LP's and also some songs that no-one had heard in the UK before - Mr. Tambourine Man, I'ts All Right Ma - I'm Only Bleeding' and 'It's All Over Now, Baby Blue'. He did 'Talking World War 111 Blues', changing the words '...took her by the hand and my heart was thumping.' to '..took her by the heart and my hand was pumping'. (I don't know why I remember that!). Halfway through his set, someone called out 'Blowin' in the Wind'. He gave the caller a withering look and carried on. He broke his plectrum. 'I bust my pick' he said. Immediately, 3 or 4 people ran from up the aisle and offered plectrums to him. He took one gratefully. Magical.

Tony Roberts

My memory of dates dims, it was never my strong suite. It was either 65 or 66 I suppose, as I sat A levels in 67 then left for the wider world. I felt so ecstatic to see my idol in the flesh. He was tiny on the stage, but the presence was enormous. Its not a cinema now and I don't live there anymore, but it will always be a treasured memory. I saw him a few years ago in the NEC. Times have changed and now I understand the lyrics 'Ah, but I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now.'

Jean Wall

This was probably the night before or after the Manchester Judas concert. Much the same happened, uproar when the electric part started. but these were all diehard folkies, 30 years of age or more! I was a 19 year old student of Psychology and had seen Bob in the play on TV and heard the first LPs. So this was baby boomers, bulge generation, there were so many of us we thought the world would change as we changed. Rock 'n' Roll was fine, I loved Chuck Berry, Chicago blues. But 3 years before my favourites had been Helen Shapiro - 'Dont treat me like a child', Roy Orbison 'Runnin Scared' etc, and the Crystals - 'He's a Rebel', and then of course the Beatles and Stones. Now I tell my 18-yr old son who sings/plays in a punk/emo band and his girlfriend studying Philosophy in Manchester that if they want a feel for what alienation is, listen to 'All along the watchtower' and 'i shall be released'.

Mike Nelson

Hello! You asked for it! My mate John and I were only fourteen when we went to see Bob at Birmingham Odeon on 12th May 1966. When we boarded the train at Malvern we had no idea how we would get back home as by the time the show closed the rail service would be closed too. Were we even a little concerned? Ummmm, no. Arriving at the theatre we took our seats in the Royal Circle, on the end of the row, me by the aisle. We were next to a party of Japanese people, one of whom kindly let us look at his programme. It included a blank page where one could note the evening's set list. Eventually the lights went down and His Bobness walked on stage to a rapturous response. We could hardly believe that we were seeing the man himself. John and I only knew a handful of Bob's songs. He would start to sing one we'd never heard before and the audience would applaud so we would join in, not wishing to show our ignorance. I most vividly remember a jaw dropping performance of'Desolation Row', and Bob's observation of "Dirt. Dirt on the stage" which was met with overwhelming enthusiasm and appreciation. He spoke to us! He spoke to us! Midway through the first set a body appeared next to me in the aisle. During the intermission this interloper told me that he had sneaked in through a window and, handing me half a crown, he asked me if I would go and get him some ciggies. Ten Park Drive, as I remember. On my way back upstairs I was surprised to see John, rushing downstairs. "Alf!" he exclaimed. "We've just had our names up on the screen!" "Oh, yeah? Have you been drinking?" "No, really! It said 'Will John Fuller and Alfie Stokes please go to the manager's office'." I still didn't believe him. "Honest, I'll bet you a million pounds! Come on!" So we went to the manager's office, to be told that John's mum was so concerned about us getting home that she had phoned the Odeon with a message for us to catch the last train to Worcester and someone would meet us and take us home. So it really did happen - and I didn't see it! All because of some bloke and his fags. Although we were somewhat bewildered by the second half of the show and the response it drew, we were thrilled to bits to be there and we wanted to stay, but we had to leave before the end otherwise we'd have been in big trouble. Never mind. We were there to witness the greatest and most infamous tour in the history of rock. Where are you now, John?

Alf Stokes

I saw Bob in 1965 at the Free Trade Hall Manchester - he was brilliant - what a performance. In 1966 I was 4 rows back from the front and again a brilliant show the Police lined the stage at the start of the electric set and set the mood for the shouting that followed, the rest everyone knows.

John Kappes

In April 1965 I was a troubled kid, at the age of fourteen I ran away from home to join the Easter CND march and just kept going. On the morning of 30th April I picked up a newspaper someone had left on a park bench in Liverpool. There was a picture of Bob with tour dates and venues. I was already a big fan, I thought he was a genius. I had screamed at the Beatles and chased the Rolling Stones across a car park for autographs but this was different. This man was no teen idol, this man was where it was at! His words, his songs, spoke about things that I didn¹t know I had been thinking till he sang them. He was just a kid himself but he sang all about the rights and wrongs of the world and a whole generation listened spellbound. So I got on the road and thumbed a lift to Sheffield. I don¹t remember if I saw that show, I think i just hung around the City hall and the hotel where the following morning I was interviewed by the Don¹t Look Back crew. I could think of very little to say when Jones Alk put the big boom microphone in front of me. ³Why do you like Bobby?² All I could do is grin and say ³I just think he¹s great, he¹s different, his words have real meaning² or something like that! I don¹t remember what i said, I know that my Manchester accent amused them all, if there are out-takes somewhere from the film I would love to see them. Then I hitched back to Liverpool and met up with a kid called Carol, the pair of us are captured forever in the film shouting ³come down¹ to Bob at the window of his Adelphi hotel suite. Later outside the Odeon they recognised me ³hey weren¹t you in Sheffield this morning?² and that conversation led to us being taken backstage to very shyly meet the man himself (I hardly remember - too awe struck - but some of the conversation was captured on the film) and later to see the show from backstage. To be standing in the wings of the stage only feet away from Bob delivering what I believe were his best, tenderest, sweetest renditions of the songs I knew and loved from his first three albums was, and I knew this even at the time, the high point of my life. There is a lot more to this story, Joan Baez took an interest in me and was very kind to me. I saw several of the shows of that tour and many more since, but that will do for now!

Elspeth French (known back then as 'Andy')

My name is Graham Ashton and I live in the Midlands, UK. I was born in 1951 and I was 14 years old when I first saw Bob Dylan in concert. I had first become aware of Bob Dylan in 1964 through hearing The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan LP. Much to my regret ever since I wasn’t able to go to his 1965 UK show in Birmingham but I did see on television the two half-hour BBC concerts that were recorded on his UK visit that year and was completely mesmerised by them. How I wish the BBC had archived them! The first Bob Dylan concert I attended was at the Birmingham Odeon on May 12, 1966. Bob walked on stage to thunderous applause (and some screams) and began singing She Belongs To Me even before he had reached the microphone. As others have noted, in the first half the audience was hushed and reverential, simply astounded at hearing songs like Fourth Time Around (not that we knew it was called that then), Visions of Johanna and Just Like A Woman for the first time. He seemed very small and fragile as he bent and swayed around the microphone. I was only ten rows from the front and the solitary spotlight that was pointed at him reflected back from his guitar, continually panning over the audience and sometimes straight towards me, giving a very strange feeling of connection with him. I couldn’t believe that the man who had written Mr Tambourine Man and Blowin’ in the Wind was in the same room that as I was in. I too can confir! m that the only time he spoke to the audience in that half was when he bent over, picked something up and drawled “Dirt….dirt on the stage..!. In the light of what was to come this could be seen as an omen. We should have known that things would be different in the second half. While waiting in the queue before the late-starting concert someone had shown me the Disc & Music Echo review of the Dublin concert where Bob had been heckled and called a “traitor” plus the already-set up drums were clearly visible throughout the first part of the show. I had Bringing It All Back Home and Highway 61 Revisited so I thought I knew what to expect. But it was the sheer volume of Tell Me, Momma (as we subsequently learned it was called) opening the second half that ignited the negative audience reaction – you just couldn’t hear what Bob was singing and he seemed to be revelling in that very fact. Here was the poet of our times but he was burying his words under a cacophonous din! The jeering from the audience was intense: “Are you trying to be a pop-star?! “Leave it to Mick Jagger”, “Get that group off the stage”, “Play some folk music, Bob”. It went on and on and on. People began to walk out to make their feelings known: they loved Bob but to them he had taken a very wrong road. Dylan took it all in his! stride though and I felt sorry for him. The more the audience heckled the more determined he seemed to play on and not give an inch. He did try to pacify the audience once by saying (if I remember correctly) “Awww, folk music… you want some folk music?....well here’s a folk song that my grand-daddy used to sing to me, he used to take me on his knee and he used to sing this song to me….it goes like this…” He then launched into Baby, Let Me Follow You Down, standing face-to-face with his guitarist (Robbie Robertson) on the solos so that you couldn’t tell who it was actually playing the lead guitar. Another funny moment occurred just before Ballad of a Thin Man when he ostentatiously sent the piano player (Richard Manuel) off the stage, pointing to the exit as if in response to the cries to “get them off, get the group off”. But of course it was only to allow Bob himself to take over the piano for that song with its refrain “Something is happening and you don’t know what it is….Do you?” As I was watching all this I noticed that a film crew who had been recording the show to the left of me had moved and were now poking their camera through the curtains right behind Bob. As Like a Rolling Stone ended and Bob walked off a girl tried to climb on stage but was held back by what we would these days call security. So, after it was all over and the lights went up I was startled to look around and see just how many of the audience had walked out. They had come to see the Bob Dylan of the protest years but he was not theirs anymore. I learned later from the music press that after the Birmingham show Bob and his cohorts went on a late night visit to Witley Court in Worcestershire along with their hosts, the Spencer Davis Group – you can see them meeting Bob in his unreleased film Eat The Document. Bob vaguely recalled this too in his 1969 Rolling Stone magazine interview. The next time I saw a Bob Dylan concert was at the Isle Of Wight Festival in 1969 when he was in his Nashville Skyline persona. He was again with The Band, as the 1966 group was by then known, but it was hard to believe it was the same Bob I had seen just over three years before. Since those long ago times I have been to many Bob Dylan concerts but to me that night tin Birmingham in May 1966 will always remain the most memorable and the one that is very special. How could I forget a night like that! I have set down these memories as accurately as I can recall them.

Graham Ashton

I was at "his first public London Concert", as it says on the programme, which I still have, (Sunday May 17th, 1964, at 3.00 pm) at the Festival Hall. Incidentally, with regard to the first two programmes Bob did for the BBC mentioned in one of the other emails, I believe these were shown on a successive Saturday nights, not Fridays. I recorded these on an old reel-to-reel tape recorder with a microphone placed in front of the TV speaker.

Paul Manning

I was working at the BBC TV Centre as a young trainee TV cameraman in the mid sixties, working on such memorable shows as "The Black and White Minstrel Show", "Top of the Pops" and many others. It was announced on the Cameraman's Duty Roster that Bob Dylan was to perform 2 shows in the TV Centre in Studio TC4. Unfortunately my Camera Crew was not rostered to the shows. In desperation I begged the Sound Supervisor (who sound mixed the shows) to let me into the Sound Control Room to watch the shows. The Control Room had a window overlooking the Studio so I had a great view! I remember well the moment that Dylan appeared The Producer/Director of the shows was a very well known LE (Light Entertainment!) man, namely Stewart Morris. Morris was adamant that none of the audience should see Dylan before he first appeared to get maximum effect with the audience! Everything was to be right before Dylan was cued to walk onto the Stage in the Studio. When confident that everything was ready, Stewart cued the Videotape Dept to run the recording tape "Run to Record" On hearing "Recording" on talkback from VT, Stewart cued the Floor Manager to bring Dylan onto the stage at the beginning of the first show. In no time there was another call from VT to say there was a fault and they must stop the recording. Hell was let loose. Stewart Morris was furious that the initial audience reaction to seeing Bob Dylan for the first time was lost. However, when everything calmed down I watched two shows from the window of the sound control room and was entranced. I just remember him standing with his acoustic guitar and mouthorgan singing all his famous tracks from mostly "Freewheeling" and "Bringing it all back home". I see on the BBC Web Page no reference to these shows in this Bob Dylan season. Are they still around or were they unceremoniously wiped like so much of the BBC archive was over the years?

Steve Jellyman

Saw the man in 1965 in newcastle, cannot remember if it was at the odean or the city hall,the man was brilliant with just a guitar a harmonica and a glass of water.never really followed him when he went electric,but that could have been me,just listened to his latest cd,very good.

Albert Scott

It started on a beach. I palled up with a guy who was on holiday in Harlech in 62 who was bass guitar in a group called the Animals. He said we “are stealing everything from this guy called Bob Dylan”. So in 1964, after playing a shared by six record of “Freewheelin’” non stop and on my 20th Birthday I hitched to London to see and hear the man. The concert was in the Festival hall and around 18th May. Dylan was billed on the posters as the writer of Peter Paul and Mary’s “Blowin in the Wind” and his name compared to there’s was very very small. On the grass in front of the hall were a lot of Beats and Folkies and a slightly familiar sweet smell –this was the audience and it was very small it filled about a third of the hall. He was billed in the programme or poster as having the Band with him but he performed alone. This kid in denims showed up on the stage with guitar and harmonica and immediately knocked over his stool and water, apologised and went off-we thought that must be the stage hand but the same guy came on and then performed like even Hendrix and Who fans(like us) could not believe. And of course he was already into confuse and challenge an audience , I think a lot of Peter Paul and Mary fans had left by the second half. He asked for encore suggestions and some bloke said “Freedom” and Dylan rounded on him and said “I aint playing that for folk that have it”. Stayed at my mates house whose Dad was playing Officer Krupki in the West End -West Side Story and tried unsuccessfully to convert him to Dylan –hitched back to Brumm on the Sunday which coincided with the Brighton Mods and Rockers riot so no one was picking up kids and it took 10 hrs. Saw many more shows but 64 was raw Dylan.

Roger Noake

Newcastle Odeon on a late winter night in '66. Bob was thin as a whip and stung twice as hard. He wore a black mohair suit, buttoned up, a tab-collar shirt, buttoned up to the top, and black Cuban-heeled boots. The sharp, hollow-cheeked, amphetamine glory of his stage presence just underlined the aura of reckless defiance, that almost menacing mood you can sometimes also catch in early photos of Jerry Lee Lewis. The first, acoustic, half was great. The second half, with The Band, was life-changing. When the curtains opened there was a bit of silly shouting from the sort of people who gave Folk Music a bad name. Apparently spurred on, Dylan and The Band broke new ground in a way that no r 'n' b or rock 'n' roll outfit had either ever done or even thought of doing. This was a redefinition not just of music but of how men should behave. The beauty, grace, intelligence and courage of the performance was impeccable. One thing stood out then, and remains a vivid memory. Dylan sang 'Just like a Woman' as 'He makes love just like a woman' and kept the subject of the song in the masculine gender throughout. I read a long time later that this song had been written after an alleged period of intimacy that Bob had shared with Allen Ginsberg. Whatever the truth, the lyrics do make much more sense sung this way. What would be so surprising about a woman making love just like a woman?

Julian Lloyd

I worked with my brother Jim in Birmingham, we regularly looked in on Junk and Second Hand shops mainly at guitars,one day I spotted Bob's first album and bought it for five shillings/25psomeone had bought it and not realising the greatness had ditched it, a turning point in my life and musical education(You heard the rest here comes the Man).On May 12th 1966 we all went to see Bob and The Band at the Odeon on New Street, Bob spoke but only to comment"There's dirt, dirt on the stage"the first half was acoustic brilliance, when bob came out for the second half he plugged in and let it rip, I still remember some of the folkies getting up and leaving shaking their heads, what a show they missed,Brilliant,Unique Fantastic a turning point for all who listened!

John Cox

I went with my parents and brother to the concert at Birmingham Odeon on 12 May 1966, the day before my 17th birthday. I remember the quietness of the first half, the reverential hush in between the applause of one song and the start of the next. Dylan looked so small, but his charisma was gigantic. Visions of Johanna was the high spot; the awe of the audience at the extraordinary images and sheer feat of memory for so many words, was palpable. I had never heard anything like it. The atmosphere became electric while waiting for the second half, and when it started, it was LOUD, really loud! There was quite a lot of shouting and booing; my own family were shouting for it to be turned down! (I still think all rock concerts are too loud, and always have done – but then I like to listen rather than be blasted..) It was phenomenal. My parents had recently started a record company with Ken Colyer, the great British trumpeter and Guv’nor of British jazz, and my father had copies of the two first LPs, Out Of Nowhere by the Ken Colyer Jazzmen, and Wandering by the Ken Colyer Skiffle Group. As we watched Dylan’s (at least we thought it was Dylan’s!) car slowly make its way through the crowd after the concert, my father suddenly rushed forward and pressed the two LPs through the slightly open window of the car! He hadn’t intimated that he was going to do this, it just seemed an impulse. I remember feeling somewhat embarrassed, as only a 17 year old can about things his parents do. We never did find out if Dylan actually saw the records - they were probably discarded - but my father always felt he must have when John Wesley Harding was released in ’68, because Dylan seemed to have gone back to his roots, essentially the same roots of Colyer’s skiffle.

Bokkie Rosenberg

I first saw Bob Dylan on two separate Friday nights on the BBC, it would be 1965. He was playing live at the Albert Hall and the BBC showed the concert in two separate parts. I later wrote (as a 16 year old) to the BBC asking them to show the concerts again but I have a nasty feeling that the BBc purged the film from their archives.

Jeff Blythin

I saw Bob both in ’65 and ’66 at the Albert Hall, London, but it is the ’66 concert which stands out in my mind. I remember the first half acoustic set as being incredibly powerful, and the released tracks from that period bear this out. The music and setting were very intimate – despite the size of the Albert Hall. The electric set came as a shock – for several reasons. The sound was loud – and the Albert Hall at that time did not have the best of acoustics. The first song “Tell me Mama” was completely unknown, and the rearrangements of old favourites like “One too many mornings” was unsettling. I remember that I started off in the gallery – the very top of the Hall where you leaned over a barrier to see the show. By the time Bob reached “like a Rolling Stone” I could sit anywhere I liked – the Hall was half empty. It was a stunning experience.

Malcolm Wright

Like Patrick Oakley's my memory of the second half of Dylan at the Albert Hall in 1966 is mainly how loud it was - the amplification was so over-the-top you couldn't hear Dylan, or even hear the band properly, and I think that this was mainly what pissed people off (including me), much more than the change in the music. Instead of "Judas!", we had "Get off, you junkie!".

Geoff Wilkins

Spring 1962 - I was just 16 and had a school friend whose family spent their holidays in Nashville, and had American country stars to stay when they toured the US Airforce bases - they also had parcels of country, folk and blues albums sent over regularly from the States which we delved into after school - a great musical education. In one parcel, we came across an album by an interesting looking guy called Bob Dylan and decided to give it a try - the effect was instant and I still remember thinking "I've been waiting to hear this all my life" (at 16!). Needless to say, I bought my own copy as soon as it was released in England, but I still get a buzz knowing that I heard Dylan's first album before it was appeared here and at a point when it had sold very few copies in America. I couldn't have known then how Dylan was going to develop, but I've stayed with him every step of the way and, like Christopher Ricks, consider myself fortunate to have been alive at the same time. Although I wasn't lucky enough to have seen him on his first forays into England, I was at the Festival Hall concert in 1964 - imagine, Dylan's first major British concert took place on a Sunday afternoon! What a thrill that was, hearing classic songs like Tambourine Man for the first time and what an engaging chap he was then - talking to the audience, cracking jokes about a naff American TV show which turned folk music into a scrubbed clean hootenanny sing-along. I would have followed him anywhere and slain dragons, although I know now that wasn't what he wanted. Saw him again on the 65 and 66 tours - came out shaking in 65 - how could he be writing so many amazing songs - loved The Band in 66, but couldn't hear the words - interesting to read recently that this was the problem for a lot of people - it wasn't that Bob had gone electric, it was just that we hung on every new line and we were missing them. I've seen Bob many times since and now have a daughter who gets him just as clearly as I do (and introduces me to lots of new music - don't ever go to see Dylan for nostalgia - it's not what he does) - we'll be at Brixton in November and I'm sure there'll be things to take my breath away. In the meantime there's No Direction Home (Cd and DVD) to savour and, who knows, maybe a new album and Chronicles - Vol 2 a little further down the line.

Paul Villiers

Like Tony Allen, I also saw Bob Dylan at Sheffield City Hall on 30 April 1965. I didn't speak to him though and sadly Joan Baez did not ask me where she could get some fruit. It remains one of my greatest memories of my Sheffield University days, along with backing Celtic Gold a couple of times at long odds. I've seen Dylan a few times since and it would be good to have "like a Rolling Stone" at my funeral. Not that it's imminent.

John Chapman

I saw both the 65 and 66 concerts in London. Re 65 my memory is one of being in a concert hall awaiting an audience with his Holiness. We he came out on stage there was very polite applause, nothing that could ever be considered emotional, more like the polite anticipatory applause accorded the conductor of the orchestra, Of course no orchestra, just his Bobliness! The atmosphere was one of being in the presence of something you don't quite understand but you know its important and you like it, you like it a lot. Re 66 a different story. I can remember filing out after the concert thinking that I was really glad to have seen this, as his Bobliness won't be around much longer. Bob had lost loadsa weight, there was little enough of him before! He was slurring and very obviously under the influence of alcohol and amphetamines, and other chemicals? Which the "motorcycle crash", when I read about it, seemed to tell the story of more than one timely 'crash'. As far as the music was concerned the first half of the show was still the well documented audience with the Bob God, although the new songs were different inasmuch as they were full of the symbolism and the trappings of the world Bob was now inhabiting, wherever that was!. There were influenes everywhere, he had obviously read a lot in the last twelve months! More difficult to define, to explain, heavy with symbolism and imagery, all which has been well documented so I won't go on about it anymore. The second half of the concert litrerally blasted out over the heads of the audience both in the sound volume, Blaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahdy loud! I had never heard anything so loud in all my life, and the fact that I was not familiar with many of the songs, I can't remember if he played stuff off of yet to be released albums, I had bought them all on day of release so there must have been unreleased material? I definately can't remember any booing, although there was a definite reaction to the electric set but it was more of a stunned silence than any 'anti' reaction. It literally just blew people away, they were aghast!. I have a memory, I can't tell whether its accurate or just part of me reliving the concerts in my dreams, the memory is that there was a gap in the curtain as they were preparing the amps etc for the second half of 66 concert, Robbie Robertson and the rest of the band, no Bob of course, were arranging or even carrying onto the stage the electric amps and other equipment. Now I know this seems unlikely, surely even then the would have had roadies? Nevertheless I am convinced that's what I saw through the gap in the curtain. The audience in 66 was different to 65. 65 was more 'yer hand over the ear' folkie and a large part of 66 contained the same people but there was a difference and that was the 66 audience were more arty more upmarket, better dressed, dare I say it intelligent, maybe thats about me wanting to be those two things, I dunno, you tell me. Both dates the audience was predominately male, 66 more so. Of course it was a long time ago, I was eighteen years old in 66, just ready for this enigmatic phenomenon which has brought me so much pleasure over the years. Time has taken its toll on the memory but the two things I am certain of; that when I saw him in 66 I didn't ever expect to see him again and secondly, there was no booing!!

Patrick W Oakley

I was 14 in 1966 and a group of us from School bought tickets for the Newcastle Odeon gig. It all happened pretty quietly until the tour started and got the publicity it did. Then everything erupted and guys at school who had not got tickets were after them. I clung on but then the bus taking us to the gig never turned up so we managed to get lifts from parents etc and we got there. I was somewhat overawed by it all as I was just so glad to be there but I remember the first half when he played some songs that we did not know as well then as we do now. The schoolmaster who accompanied us to the show said “He is interesting but I could do without the harmonica” which I remember vividly. The second half divided the audience but blew us away. I reckoned he was entitled to play his songs the way he wanted but noone had ever heard that level of sound from a band like that and it was incredible to take in. “Like a rolling stone” blew us all home. Some years later when I bought the first bootleg album of the so called “Albert Hall” gig under the counter (how weird that seems now) and I heard the electric stuff in all its majesty I realised how lucky I had been to be there on that night in Newcastle. Unrepeatable.

David Surtees

On Thursday May 12th 1966 I travelled with 2 friends, John and Jean, by train from Stoke to Birmingham to see and hear Bob at the Odeon in New Street. I was just 17, and extremely excited at the prospect of the evening ahead. I thought I knew what to expect - I had read the review of an earlier concert in that morning's "Disc and Music Echo" - but nothing could have prepared me for the experience. The concert started about an hour late, and in the first accoustic half the atmosphere was hushed and reverential, as Bob performed mostly recent stuff and some new songs - I remember clearly that "Visions of Johanna" was just stunning in that setting. The second half, however, just blew me away. It was so loud, so raw, so powerful, unlike anything I'd heard before. The atmosphere was as electric as the music, the tension was palpable, as a sizeable minority booed and heckled. We clapped and cheered to try to drown them out. And then, suddenly, it was over and Bob had gone. No encores. We stood for a while, not believing what we had just heard. We missed the last train home, and spent the night in and around New Street Station, and caught the first moning train back. I got into trouble for skipping school the next day, but none of that mattered. I had witnessed the most amazing event in my life up to that point, and as such, it has stayed with me ever since. I still feel "just 17" when I thing about it nearly 40 years later.

Mick Phillips

I was 14 yrs old and my ticket was for the Friday. Had to get permission from the Head Teacher, which was only obtained because my father asked for me to be excused from the weekly Combined Cadet Force parades so I could attend “ a concert at the Albert Hall” - if only ‘Prod’ knew who the artist was... When we arrived at AH a large car pulled up to the kerb and HE got out and waved at us as we shouted out to him. The show was absolutely fantastic, the Band were superb and Bob dealt with the diehards’ barracking brilliantly. As a 14 year old I was probably amongst the youngest in the audience but it was a life changing experience – even better than being at Wembley the same year to see Bobby Moore lift the world cup. Also saw him on the Isle of Wight and at Blackbush, both also stupendous events but nothing will ever match that night at the Albert Hall. Rock and Roll and poetry all in one.

Steve Hall

I was 17 in late 1962, and occasionally played in the London folk scene. I was small potatoes at the Troubadour, in Earl's Court, where Martin Carthy was making his name. One day Martin Carthy came with Bob Dylan who was in England for a BBC TV play (some bright BBC spark had brought Dylan over to do this, but I gather that they discovered he couldn't act, and he ended up in just one scene sitting on a fire escape playing guitar). Dylan was introduced with great excitement, although most of the audience had not heard of him at the time. I was fortunate enough to be sitting on the floor, literally at his feet - looking up at him I was struck by the size of his nose, which was comparable to my own. Dylan sang three songs, of which I remember Talking John Birch Society Blues and Hard Rain. The latter simply blew everyone away - it was an astonishing and spine chilling performance. I doubt if anyone left that night without being a Dylan fan and determined to buy his first album which was only just available in the UK. A few months later, I was again in the Troubador when Martin Carthy arrived with Dylan's second album - Freewheeling. The show stopped and the whole club settled down to listen to it - wow! Then, in 1964, I saw him at the Festival Hall, which was a wonderful and surprisingly cosy venue. I remember that he had forgotten his capo and asked if anyone on the audience had one - someone did, of course. I think this was the first time I'd seen a harmonica holder, and I promptly set about making my own. I next saw Dylan at the Albert Hall during his 1965 tour but, more memorably, as a college student at Bristol, I saw him at the Colston Hall in 1966 - the tour with the Hawks, with half acoustic and half electric sets. I confess I wasn't ready for the electric set, which was so loud (at least where I was sitting) that it was actually painful. If anyone remembers someone shouting out "Turn it down!" - that was me. Not my finest hour, and made worse in my mind by the later reports of the "Judas" taunt in Manchester. But it was a life-changing artistic experience and confirmed him to me as a true and unique genius. I feel proud and fortunate to be alive throughout all his creative output. I can hardly imagine feeling any different if I had lived in Mozart's time.

Colin Wraight

I remember the Manchester Evening News on the day of the concert (May 17 1966) in broadsheet days and half of page 2 was devoted to Dylan being in town. That was the first I knew of the concert although I had at least 4 of his albums.I was 14 at the time. I asked my mum if I could go and try to see him just entering or leaving the Free Trade Hall (you know how it is). She gave me £1(I think my "spends" were 10 shillings a week at the time) and I had some bus fare of my own. Outside the gig I got talking to a student from Sheffield who told me that his girlfriend had flu & couldn't make it,he said I could have his girlfriends ticket. It was in the best seats,second row ,right in the middle.The ticket was priced at £1 and the chap in question let me buy it off him for £1 and gave me some money back so I could get back home to Debdale Park,Gorton,on the bus.I remember the actual concert but have to admit to being in awe of everything that was going on. I seem to remember Dave Berry being a couple of seats away & there were other "pop" stars there.Why people were surprised with the electric 2nd half of the concert was a shock to me because I think Blonde on Blonde had already been released and the 2 previous albums were mainly electric. It was a nice surprise when,30 years later, the actual concert was released as the Royal Albert Hall concert, which,as everybody knows was the Free Trade Hall gig that I was present at. Finally I would like to say thanks to my mum,who died earlier this year, also many,many thanks to the guy from Sheffield who let me have his girls ticket. He must know who he is. THANKYOU.

Neil Tomlinson

When Dylan played in Liverpool, he was "booed" and the whole show was really slammed by the audience. Considering that this particular concert really was a big deal at the time I think you need to consider what happened very much in context. The popular music scene had recently been dramatically changed by the Beatles. Previously, contemporary pop music in Britain had been pseudo-American rhythm and blues played by pseudo-American teddy boys sporting Cuban heels and drainpipe pants. That had been a marvellous revolution in its time but for us teenagers the latest trend was flares and mop hairstyles, anything associated to that previous era was definitely repulsive. Although the Beatles were revolutionary, they were mere lightweights in the early days so the arrival of the gritty "American folk " a la Dylan soon became the focus for the student coffee house elite (or those who thought of themselves like that.) "Pop" music was given very little radio air time, certainly the more esoteric stuff was never played, so the only access we had to artists like Dylan, was through his first LP records. The first albums were all folksy solo guitar in the style of Woody Guthrie but the message was so powerful that we disaffected teens immediately related to it and indeed “wore it on our sleeve”. Dylan immediately became an icon for our generation, we identified ourselves with him, us post war babies. He was our spokesman, he was living proof that we were right to protest about our situation, living as we were with traumatised parents who having been robbed of their teenage years, seemed to be intent that we shouldn’t have any either. So on that fateful night when we queued around the Odeon cinema we had very specific expectations of our man. I would have been happy if he had just come on and talked to us. Instead, after a short folky session, on walked a gang of teddy boys with electric guitars and began to play pop music. No wonder the place erupted. At one point the yelling fazed Dylan enough to pause between numbers. "The times they are a changing" a voice pleaded from the stalls. "The times they are a changing" he returned with an icy glare until, warmed by a brief clap of support from around the theatre, The Band carried on with the rest of the show. I noted that a huge tape-recording machine was operating on stage all through the performance. Some walked out, but most stayed. Apart from everything else, Ten and sixpence for a balcony seat was a lot in those days and anyway, the man was right. The times were a changing.

Lou Moore

I was at the final concert of the 66 tour at the RAH (I've kept the program as a treasured souvenir). After the the final song (LARS) of the ill-received electric 2nd set, Bob spat out, "You won't be seeing me any more and I won't be seeing you any more" and flung his harmonica rig into the the front stalls before leaving the stage -I wonder which lucky soul who got to keep it? Fortunately, he relented...

Peter Quilley

I saw Bob on the 65 and 66 tours in Liverpool both brilliant shows. I have a memory of a heckler on the rock session shouting out the "The Times they are a changing" and Bob laconically say something like - "yes they are" - the perfect putdown - maybe it was just a Bob Dyaln dream

Mike McLachlan

Was it really over 40 years ago, how can that be. I was 15 and had the misfortune to be a 5th year boarding student at a school in Bakewell, Derbyshire, but the good fortune to have a House Master who was really into Bob Dylan's music and also entrusted us with his copy of the "Bob Dylan" album. We played it over and over, well we only had 3 albums of our own. It was our House Master, Brian Rich and some of his teacher friends who organised the tickets to the 30th April 1965 concert in Sheffield City Hall. I don't remember the trip to and from Sheffield but the rest of the night is etched into my brain. It was 4 days before my 16th birthday so I suppose I would have been one of the youngest there, and I felt it, in the coffee bar before the concert I was surrounded by bigger, older, hairier types, who must have been from university or left over from the beatnik age. If you've seen Pennebaker's documentary "Don't look back" then you've seen the concert I saw, but what I remember was the silences in between the applause for one song and the start of the next one, it was as if no one was breathing, all the better to hear EVERYTHING. Several months later as a poorly paid engineering apprentice I started to acquire Bob's albums, but stopped when I'd got to "Bringing it all back home" I think I must have been one of the fans who preferred the Bluesy/Guthrie sound before the dawn of his Rock Age. I later sold all the albums for bargain prices but I do now have the same 5 albums back, but on cd. "Ah but I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now"

Ian D. Slater

I saw Bob Dylan at the Royal Albert Hall in 1966 - I was 19 and it was my second live concert. The Beatles had been my first (well actually my Dad took me to see Cliff Richard before that but I didn't count that one). I remember the hairs on the back of my neck standing up when he sang Just Like a Woman and Hey Mr Tambourine Man. I had never had an experience like it before and I remember talking about it for weeks afterwards. Wonderful charismatic man - what a wonderful poet. We were told that The Beatles were in the audience at the Royal Albert Hall - even if they weren't it made a special memory.

Diane Francis

I was in my last year at Manchester University and managed to get tickets for the concert. It was so packed out my friend and I were one of those who had to actually sit on the stage behind the Man himself! I clearly remember the suprise at the start of the second half when the electric session began and can remember the famous "Judas" shout from a member of the audience. I bought a book describing the evening called "Like the Night.." by C.P Lee ..sadly although the photos in it clearly show members of the audience on stage they are from the the wrong side..so I'm hoping the film clips on Arena show me in all my 21 year old splendour.

Howard Wiles

I saw Bob Dylan at Sheffield City Hall on 30 April 1965. The next morning I spoke to him and Joan Baez whilst Pennebaker was filming; however, this wasn’t used in the final film. Bob signed a promo leaflet called “My Life in a Stolen Moment”, which was subsequently withdrawn. I am selling this at Christies on 28 September, Christies have used the leaflet as the front page of the catalogue, which is really nice. The whole experience has stayed with me and is as real now as it was then. I’ll never forget Joan Baez walking out of the hotel: she was exquisitely beautiful. She asked me if I knew where to buy some fruit but I didn’t know so a girl I was standing with walked off with her to the shop. Joan said to me, “Don’t worry you won’t miss Bobby”. There’s a bit in the Pennebaker film where they are eating the fruit so this is a real connection for me. I got both their autographs on the same piece of card. This is also going at Christies.

Tony Allen

In the 60's I used to hang out at the Troubadour - a coffee bar cum music venue near Earl's Court. In the basement was a sort of cellar folk club. Robbie Hall and Jimmie McGreggar used to play there, plus a gaggle of folk and blues guitarists. One evening a strange creature with two friends sloped down the steps. The main character - the smallest (and I mean SMALL) had a black leather jacket and...sunglasses. It was gloomy enough in a cellar at about 1 o'clock in the morning. Only a severely conceited person would go for that. Yes , it was Bob Dylan, though we were totally underwhelmed by this at the time and only his increasing fame turned this event into a solidified memory over subsequent years. I still don't know to this day what made him ' the main character', yet it was immediately apparent that this was the case. Perhaps that's what fame stems from; a kind of presence that coems from personal conceit - or to put it more politely; total self belief.

Christopher Malden

I saw him in Newcastle on his electric tour. The first half was his earlier acoustic work and then he brought the band on! Lots of boo'ing and shouts similar to 'we can get that from The Animals'. After the initial shock to our comfort zone, both my mate Pete and me really enjoyed the direction he took in the music. Sometimes there can be no one more facist than the folkies!

Phil McGloin

I remember 'The Madhouse On Castle Street' very well, and have often wondered what had happened to the tape - wiped I suppose. Dylan put in a great performance as a singer, not an actor, and sang a song called 'swan on the river goes gliding by'. No one else seems to remember this play. I also saw him in London, Royal Albert Hall I think, and maybe Festival Hall too (?) around 63/64, and still have a programme on which I marked, in pencil, the songs he sang.

Lindsay Rough

At the Singers Folk Club in Greys Inn Rd, the Pindar of Wakefield pub I think, Peggy Seeger and Ewan MacColl were singing to a packed house as usual their rigourous blend of traditional UK and US songs. After the break there was a small group at the entrance, one with guitar. Ewan announced 'We have a young singer from America here tonight who is making a stir over there - please welcome Bob Dylan'' . Since most people had never heard of him there was light applause as for any other young hopeful (although to get a hearing at the singers you had to be pretty good). He walked up, sang 'Blowing in the wind' without a spoken word and the crowd went wild. It was so much a new direction. However he just walked out, also without a word. I dont think he stuck around to hear anything else. So my memory is quite fleeting. I saw a BBC TV play that used that track as its title track at about that time and I heard he had flown over to the UK to make that recording but I've never heard anyone refer to that. It must have been pretty well the first time he was heard on the UK broadcasting system. It was probably around 1961-2.

Guillemette and Mike Cox

I was 16 in 1965 and Dylan crazy. I would have jumped through hoops to get tickets to see him. I was listening to and playing a lot of folk music back then. There was a series of small folk concerts played around the country towards the end of ‘65 which were promoted by Tito Burns (the same promoters of the ’66 tour by Dylan). In order to encourage people to attend these concerts, the promoters guaranteed that all attendees would be eligible for Dylan Tickets in May ’66. Of course I duly purchased my ticket for the concert and duly attended the Oddfellows Hall in Fratton Road, Portsmouth (an old Masonic Hall with seats for a 100 or so people) not really knowing what to expect. I watched the concert, which had a number of acts, traditional and contemporary folk music and a bit of genuine blue grass from an American band. It was really good entertaining stuff. The concert closed with a largely unknown singer songwriter act, a guy called Paul Simon!!! Wow! The very next day I went out and purchased a copy of ‘The Paul Simon Songbook’, Paul Simon’s debut album. In May ’66 I was at the Royal Albert Hall to see Bob Dylan go electric to the dismay of 100’s of ‘disenfranchised’ folkies. I must admit that at first I was surprised by the turn of events but as far as I was concerned Dylan could do no wrong and if he wanted to be a rock star rather than a folk singer that was fine by me. Anyhow, if we wanted another ‘folk singer’, the world was about to discover something that a few of us already knew about, the musical genius of Paul Simon.

Des Adams

We queued knowledgeably. The headline on the front page of the Evening Times declared,"Dylan Blows In!" They were actually giving copies of this special edition away for free, but nobody took one. This was 1966, the only thing to be seen carrying in public was the mono LP Highway 61 Revisited. I had been totally hooked on Dylan since watching the two BBC TV 1965 concerts as a fourteen year old whose musical education had been limited to my big sister's singles collection, Cliff and the smooth haircut brigade. It wasn't the musical content of his performaces that hit me, it was the huge spectrum of his subject matter wrought into breathtaking lyrics. From then on it was a rollercoaster of discovery, borrowing or buying the LPs and playing this wonderful music over and over. Not surprisingly, the whole Dylan experience led me down some marvellous side roads to poetry, art, photography and the obvious guitar bashing. So, there I was, taking my seat in the Odeon theater to actually see and hear the music for myself. Much had been reported about the booing and heckling at previous concerts, so this Glasgow audience was not going to be outdone. As the euphoria from the acoustic first half performance wore off, we cleared our throats in readyness for a heckle-fest. As I mentioned earlier, my sister was my musical mentor until 1965. She dragged me to to concerts by the Searchers, Freddy and the Dreamers, the whole package tour adventure. This had not prepared me for Dylan and Co. unleashing their electric storm. We were all thrown back in our seats as they let us hear some good old American music. Of course we shouted abuse between songs, this was audience participation included in the ticket price. Song after song, each one better than the last right up to Like A Rolling Stone. What a way to go! Looking back on this great landmark night, I feel that we weren't really ready enough for this experience to do it justice. Personally I peaked too early musically because of this. Fifteen years old, going home on the bus with two hours of Bob Dylan ringing in my ears. What chance did I have? Nothing can match that.

Matt Wilson

On May 3, 1966 i wore my really old faded jeans and a broken pair of Beetle boots and hand painted the name "Dylan" on my faded railroad jacket...I lived in Waterford, Ireland and made the journey to Dublin with my friends Jimmy Ryan,Frankie O'Reilly, my brother Jerard and Eddie Wexford at the driving wheel...we believed that we were really cool and on our way to see and hear the greatest singer/song writer in the world...we had almost worn out our copies of HIGHWAY 61 Revisited. That evening while waiting in the lobby of the concert hall we could hear Bob and the Band doing TOM Thumb's BLUES...some ten minutes later the doors opened and we spotted the program seller...I remember jimmy and myself bought 5 copies each...some people asked if we were program sellers. After the house lights went down and the curtain was raised...the man himself appeared in his polka dot shirt and a cool suit and all that freaked out hair--great...look! the solo set was excellent and the electric set was excellent. Dylan was brillent...solo and electric...those words he sung were pure beat poetry and all the talk, books and pub discussions that followed over the years about how different or how wrong he was don't mean anything to me...sure, there were some people who called out loud when Dylan appeared with the band...one lone person called for Bob to sing "Positively Fourth Street"...Dylan paused and called back "Have you ever bin on "Positively Fourth Street" and then launched into a brillent version of "Like a Rolling Stone"...the curtain was dropped and we hit the road "speechless" --look, history was unfolding before our eyes and I don't believe anyone could take it all in... Sure, now everyone claims to have understood all that was taking place on that now famous tour....for me, I saw and heard the greatest and if Dylan had chosen to sit on a stool and read his beat poetry to us...then that would have being a brillent night also...I still attend any Dylan show I can...long may he live!

Eamonn Long

When Dylan came over to record his part in the BBC Play "The Madhouse On Castle Street" He dropped into Collet's Record Shop 70 New Oxford Street London WC! which specialised in folk music and world music and Jazz. It was late 162 or earl 1963 and I walked into the shop. It was a regular haunt. I had a book under my arm "The White Goddess" by Robert Graves (a somewhat impenetrable book on poetic myth and poetic language and style). Dylan was standing by the counter and said "You read that?" I replied "Sort of" and we went for a 2 - 3 hour natter about poetry and music in the Star Restaurant in Old Compton Street. (A vaguely Greek restaurant, relatively cheap restaurant which catered to folkies, buskers etc). Dylan drilled me with questions about poetry and literature generally. A somewhat sponge-like style that left stimulated but drained. Rimbaud, Baudelaire, Camus, Lautramont, etc. It is evident to me that there are similarities in the form of "A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall" and "Cad Goddeau" (The Battle Of The Trees) an old Welsh poem in canta-fable form. Late on from 1964 I worked in Collet's and met him a couple of times between 1964 and 1968 but resulting meetings were insignificant. He tends to cut people dead when he's finished with them. I'm not offended as this quality is typical of a certain creative sort of mind. Incidentally I had bought the first album and it was I who audio-taped bits of "The Madhouse Of Castle Street" which I have recently supplied to the BBC.

Hans Fried

I saw Bob Dylan and took the pictures that everybody knows of him at the "Judas" concert - May 17 1966. I was one of the interviewees on Andy Kershaw's "Ghosts of Electricity" Radio 2 Documentary in 1999.

Mark Makin

My name is Thomas Heywood, I was just 17 when I saw Bob at Manchester's Free Trade Hall Concert - This was the concert when the prat walked down the aisle and shouted "Judas" and had to be thrown out, he was complaining about Bob's Band accompanyment and going electric. Most people just wanted to get on and see Bob - so the very exaggerated view of the audience booing was not right, from what I can remember, and very clearly I must add, this lonely guy claimed great accolade in starting something, but really he was just another Arran pullovered d***head around at that time who listened to Pete Seger and Peter Paul and Mary. He had no idea who we were all hear to see.I personally sat in amazement at Bob and Robbie and the guys from the states who gave us something never to forget. If I could tell Bob one thing - he has been a man who saved souls - especially mine!

Thomas Heywood