The recent sale of Bob Dylan's one-off recording of "Blowin' in the Wind" for $1.7 million dollars has left me reflecting on a very different way of evaluating art and distribution.
The Unknown Craftsman: A Japanese Insight into Beauty is a book of the writings of Sōetsu Yanagi, a philosopher and founder of the mingei (folk craft) movement in Japan in the mid-1920s. Mingei celebrates the beauty in everyday handcrafted objects, such as ceramics and furniture, and how they bring daily beauty into the lives of so many people. These pieces of art are made with care, patience, and skill by craftspeople, ones who are, for the most part, anonymous and unknown. In the surfing world, mingei is often referenced to contrast handmade and hand-shaped surfboards (how all surfboards were once made) against machine-made factory surfboards (how most surfboards are now made). As an avid surfer, I can attest to the functional "magic" of a well-made, hand-shaped surfboard.*
There are a lot of parallels to pop music here. These days, with the omnipresence of consumer culture and influencer-based social media, nobody is anonymous anymore, not surfboard shapers, and certainly not most successful pop musicians and record producers. But, at its best, a well-crafted pop song is a work of art that (now, more than ever, with streaming services) can enrich the lives of many, bringing beauty and culture into the lives of millions of people – ones who might not be able to afford to fill their lives with "high art."
When Bob Dylan first released "Blowin' in the Wind" in 1963, this was certainly the case. This simple, beautifully crafted, heartfelt song reached millions of people, and its message helped shape the course of society in the 1960s. To see this song re-recorded by T Bone Burnett (Tape Op#67) as part of his Ionic Originals series, and then sold to an obviously extremely wealthy person for $1.7 million dollars, saddens me in a way I cannot entirely express. I fail to understand the motivation here by Mr. Dylan and Mr. Burnett.