Bob Dylan's message to Martin Carthy 9/27/2025

[BluesRunTheGame]

If you don’t know, Martin Carthy is a giant of English folk music. They had a big tribute concert celebrating his contributions to the world of music today. This little message by Bob Dylan was shown at the show.

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In ‘61 Dylan asked Carthy to show him how to play Scarborough Fair. Dylan never worked up his own version.

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Pretty quickly though, he wrote a new song using a melody similar to Carthy’s arrangement. This is probably as close as we’ll get to the very beginning of the singer/songwriter movement.

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[yonder]

1. I've been a Martin Carthy fan for 50 years thereabouts.

His knowledge of traditional ballads/song cycles as well as the modes and melodies that may or may not have been originally associated with them is unequalled, IMO. Combine that knowledge with his absolutely unique guitar style and the result is an extraordinary, mostly traditional musicianship that he has graciously shared for many, many decades.

Many of us learned the folk song "Billy Boy" in grade school. It is major-sounding, innocent version suitable for grade schoolers: The Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval/Mom's Apple Pie version. Like many folk songs, the version(s) from whence it came is a bit different and may result in some trouble for anyone singing it for Mrs. Newton's 4th grade class. Here's Martin Carthy's take on it. I don't remember who it was collected from, could be a Child ballad:

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