Dylan@80: Collectors Roundtable

Long before the Bob Dylan Archive® arrived in Tulsa, collectors around the world have been gathering fragments of the artist’s extraordinary career: bootleg tapes, guitars, ticket stubs, magazines, correspondence, and even his childhood home in Hibbing. In this session, some of the world’s most prominent collectors will focus on a single item of particular interest in order to talk about their work and their passion. Moderated by Michael Chaiken, Curator of the Bob Dylan Archives®.

David Eckstrom, Rare Issues of The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan Album

David Eckstrom has been a Bob Dylan collector since 1978. He is the owner of a retail record store since 1984 called Forever Young Records located in Grand Prairie, Texas.

Jeff Gold, Author/Archivist/Collector

Jeff Gold has been buying and selling collectible records and music memorabilia for 48 years. Profiled by RollingStone as one of the five “top collectors of high-end music memorabilia,” he travels the world to search out the finest music collectibles. An internationally recognized expert in the field, he appraised the Bob Dylan Archive®. Gold is a frequent consultant to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Experience Music Project/MPOP, and various record labels and cultural institutions.

Oddbjørn Saltnes, Bob Dylan Ticket Collecting

Oddbjørn Saltnes is 51 years old and lives on the west coast of Southern Norway, in the area where one finds the long narrow fjords, mountains, and glaciers. Bergen is the nearest city–still 4 hours from the small town called Sogndal, where he resides. Saltnes is a Social Therapist and currently works with rehabilitation for psychiatric patients. He started his Bob Dylan collection as a 15-16 years old boy in the early ‘80s. Saltnes mostly focuses on collecting books, magazine covers, picture sleeves of vinyl singles, ads, cards, and other memorabilia in general from all over the world.

Jeff Friedman, Representing the Tapers

When not spreading the gospel of neon, Jeff spends his unlit hours inhaling all things he considers “good music” and leaving no stone unturned for unreleased material everywhere.

Arie de Reus, The Hard Copies

Arie de Reus is a retired general practitioner. De Reus’ interest in Bob’s music started in March 1968 when he was 15 years old. Over the years, de Reus has collected a large number of ‘hard copies’, such as records, acetates, master tapes, books, photos, magazines, press cuttings, etc

Mitch Blank, The Disease Of Collecting Meets the Science of Archiving

Decades before the Bob Dylan Archive came into existence, it was passionate fans who first began collecting, recording, and tracing the history and evolution of Dylan’s work. They exchanged mimeographed fanzines, recordings, and other artifacts and ephemera. Mitch Blank, a renowned figure of New York’s Greenwich Village, was among one of the first to keep a record. We caught up recently with Mitch, Associate of The Bob Dylan Center, at his West Village apartment. A virtual museum of Americana and the history of the folk movement in New York, Mitch has been fastidiously cataloging his own personal archive which will be making its way to Tulsa, Oklahoma. A serious and dedicated collector, Mitch’s archive is an unrivaled collection of unusual objects, ephemera, and artifacts that, over many years, he’s generously offered to scholars, researchers, and fans worldwide.