Reid Rosefelt
Well-known member
I am working on an album now which will be completely songs about women. Some of them are women in my life, some of them are fictional, but some are real women I've never met.
For two of them, I read about them and then wrote my own song. Took a few things I learned and then I used my imagination and put myself into them.
But I also have a song about Suze Rotolo, who was Bob Dylan's girlfriend. She can be seen on the cover of "The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan," he writes about her in "Chronicles," and she is in Scorsese's "No Direction Home: Bob Dylan" documentary. The character played by Elle Fanning in "A Complete Unknown" has nothing to do with anything about her, in my opinion, except being on the "Freewheelin'" album. Dylan gave complete approval on the script of the film, with only one change--that character could not be called Suze Rotolo. Because she really wasn't at all. I"m cool with the character, because like so many things in the movie, there are numerous things in the movie that are untrue, but contribute to a story that I think is essentially true. Elle Fanning is a terrific actor and her fictional character was necessary to the fictional construct they put together to tell the story of Dylan in a short period of time.
What makes my Suze Rotolo song different is that she wrote a book, "A Freewheelin Time: A Memoir of Greenwich Village in the Sixties." She's expresses herself very poetically, and I've used her words all over the place. The title of my song is "Not a String on His Guitar." Her words. I wouldn't have thought that up.
I do have a mutual friend with her family (she thanks him at the end of the book). My strong instinct is to approach my friend with the song and ask him to take it to her son Luca. I want to offer a share in profits that come from the song. Not the copyright, but some profits I've spent a lot of time writing the song, copyright fees, I'm going to hire a singer and a mixer to get it ready for streaming, but I don't expect to make five cents on it. It's not particularly generous for me to offer a share of my nothing.
On the other hand, if the song does well it will be partly due to the fact that certain people care deeply about her. Not to mention her beautiful words that I am using. So if the song makes money, then she earned it, in my book, even though I wrote it and laid out a lot of money (for me) to get it up on Spotify, etc.
It's quite possible that if I did that, Luca would not like the song at all, and that could open up a can of worms. My opinion of Dylan is different from Suze's. She was an artist in her own right and didn't want to be known as his muse. She thinks he was a genius, but not a good person--so she had to leave him. But she was a better person than I'll ever be and her final note is that she got as much out of him as he did out of her. (That's in my song.)
I'm a darker person and more judgmental. I don't see any sign that Dylan ever gave one second of thought to the Civil Rights movement before he met her. She was born a "red-diaper baby," a child of Communists, and she spent every day marching and working for Civil Rights and other causes. She was a true believer. She never stopped fighting for social justice for the rest of her too short life. He was a brilliant cynical careerist. He was living with her every day, and suddenly the Buddy Holly fan became the "Voice of a Generation." After Suze left him, I think Dylan pretty much dropped that kind of protest music forever. I stopped listening to him, so I can't say for sure. Maybe "Hurricane."
There's more to the story than that, of course. He came in to New York loving all kinds of music and every night he could go into a club and play any kind of music he wanted--as long as it was folk music. He loved folk music, he idolized Woody Guthrie, so it wasn't hard for him to be a folkie for a while. Suze's sister Carla, was the assistant to Alan Lomax, so this gave him special access to one of the greatest treasure troves of folk music. But subsequent history shows the diversity of the music Dylan liked.
I love Dylan's music, and he was everything to me in my teens, but today I see Dylan as a brilliant bullshitting careerist, and very mean to people, particularly Suze, who he publicly cheated on. I think a lot of what he became came from Suze Rotolo. She introduced him to Rimbaud and Brecht, and that got into the development of his music. He wrote some of his best songs about her, including "Don't Think Twice," "Boots of Spanish Leather," and "Tomorrow is a Long Time." And of course, maybe his worst song, "Ballad in Plain D," about their breakup. (Dylan has since said, "I look back and say 'I must have been a real schmuck to write that.' I look back at that particular one and say, of all the songs I've written, maybe I could have left that alone.")
But I strongly dispute that he only wrote the songs that are commonly seen as Suze Rotolo songs. I see her in all kinds of songs where Dylan puts a great woman on a pedestal, like "Love Minus Zero: No Limit." It is my opinion that Dylan never stopped writing songs about Suze Rotolo and never stopped loving Suze Rotolo. I see her face when I hear "Sad-Eyed Lady of The Lowlands" (bullshit it's Sarah Lownds) and in the female characters in "Blood on the Tracks." She was the love of his life and when she left him, he never recovered. Luckily, Dylan wasn't the love of her life and she found happiness with Italian film editor Enzo Bartoccioli.
But Suze probably wouldn't have liked what I just wrote. Luca probably wouldn't either. He might not want to be connected to my song. But if I offer him a share at least he couldn't say that I didn't respect her contribution and want to compensate her family for that.
But my song isn't journalism. In the insanely unlikely possibility that the song attracts attention, it could spark somebody else to write about her or make a movie about her. Which she so amply deserves, in my book. And my song is way more accurate than the Elle Fanning character.
Your thoughts? Do you think I am making a mistake by wanting to approach Luca? The only thing I'm afraid of is that they would somehow try to stop me from releasing the song, which I don't think they can do. She is a public figure. And I love her, if you haven't been able to tell by what I've written above. I wish I'd known her.
For two of them, I read about them and then wrote my own song. Took a few things I learned and then I used my imagination and put myself into them.
But I also have a song about Suze Rotolo, who was Bob Dylan's girlfriend. She can be seen on the cover of "The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan," he writes about her in "Chronicles," and she is in Scorsese's "No Direction Home: Bob Dylan" documentary. The character played by Elle Fanning in "A Complete Unknown" has nothing to do with anything about her, in my opinion, except being on the "Freewheelin'" album. Dylan gave complete approval on the script of the film, with only one change--that character could not be called Suze Rotolo. Because she really wasn't at all. I"m cool with the character, because like so many things in the movie, there are numerous things in the movie that are untrue, but contribute to a story that I think is essentially true. Elle Fanning is a terrific actor and her fictional character was necessary to the fictional construct they put together to tell the story of Dylan in a short period of time.
What makes my Suze Rotolo song different is that she wrote a book, "A Freewheelin Time: A Memoir of Greenwich Village in the Sixties." She's expresses herself very poetically, and I've used her words all over the place. The title of my song is "Not a String on His Guitar." Her words. I wouldn't have thought that up.
I do have a mutual friend with her family (she thanks him at the end of the book). My strong instinct is to approach my friend with the song and ask him to take it to her son Luca. I want to offer a share in profits that come from the song. Not the copyright, but some profits I've spent a lot of time writing the song, copyright fees, I'm going to hire a singer and a mixer to get it ready for streaming, but I don't expect to make five cents on it. It's not particularly generous for me to offer a share of my nothing.
On the other hand, if the song does well it will be partly due to the fact that certain people care deeply about her. Not to mention her beautiful words that I am using. So if the song makes money, then she earned it, in my book, even though I wrote it and laid out a lot of money (for me) to get it up on Spotify, etc.
It's quite possible that if I did that, Luca would not like the song at all, and that could open up a can of worms. My opinion of Dylan is different from Suze's. She was an artist in her own right and didn't want to be known as his muse. She thinks he was a genius, but not a good person--so she had to leave him. But she was a better person than I'll ever be and her final note is that she got as much out of him as he did out of her. (That's in my song.)
I'm a darker person and more judgmental. I don't see any sign that Dylan ever gave one second of thought to the Civil Rights movement before he met her. She was born a "red-diaper baby," a child of Communists, and she spent every day marching and working for Civil Rights and other causes. She was a true believer. She never stopped fighting for social justice for the rest of her too short life. He was a brilliant cynical careerist. He was living with her every day, and suddenly the Buddy Holly fan became the "Voice of a Generation." After Suze left him, I think Dylan pretty much dropped that kind of protest music forever. I stopped listening to him, so I can't say for sure. Maybe "Hurricane."
There's more to the story than that, of course. He came in to New York loving all kinds of music and every night he could go into a club and play any kind of music he wanted--as long as it was folk music. He loved folk music, he idolized Woody Guthrie, so it wasn't hard for him to be a folkie for a while. Suze's sister Carla, was the assistant to Alan Lomax, so this gave him special access to one of the greatest treasure troves of folk music. But subsequent history shows the diversity of the music Dylan liked.
I love Dylan's music, and he was everything to me in my teens, but today I see Dylan as a brilliant bullshitting careerist, and very mean to people, particularly Suze, who he publicly cheated on. I think a lot of what he became came from Suze Rotolo. She introduced him to Rimbaud and Brecht, and that got into the development of his music. He wrote some of his best songs about her, including "Don't Think Twice," "Boots of Spanish Leather," and "Tomorrow is a Long Time." And of course, maybe his worst song, "Ballad in Plain D," about their breakup. (Dylan has since said, "I look back and say 'I must have been a real schmuck to write that.' I look back at that particular one and say, of all the songs I've written, maybe I could have left that alone.")
But I strongly dispute that he only wrote the songs that are commonly seen as Suze Rotolo songs. I see her in all kinds of songs where Dylan puts a great woman on a pedestal, like "Love Minus Zero: No Limit." It is my opinion that Dylan never stopped writing songs about Suze Rotolo and never stopped loving Suze Rotolo. I see her face when I hear "Sad-Eyed Lady of The Lowlands" (bullshit it's Sarah Lownds) and in the female characters in "Blood on the Tracks." She was the love of his life and when she left him, he never recovered. Luckily, Dylan wasn't the love of her life and she found happiness with Italian film editor Enzo Bartoccioli.
But Suze probably wouldn't have liked what I just wrote. Luca probably wouldn't either. He might not want to be connected to my song. But if I offer him a share at least he couldn't say that I didn't respect her contribution and want to compensate her family for that.
But my song isn't journalism. In the insanely unlikely possibility that the song attracts attention, it could spark somebody else to write about her or make a movie about her. Which she so amply deserves, in my book. And my song is way more accurate than the Elle Fanning character.
Your thoughts? Do you think I am making a mistake by wanting to approach Luca? The only thing I'm afraid of is that they would somehow try to stop me from releasing the song, which I don't think they can do. She is a public figure. And I love her, if you haven't been able to tell by what I've written above. I wish I'd known her.
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