Almost Wordless Wednesday: A Glimpse of Duluth Culture Revealed in 7 Posters of Coming Events

 A random batch of current posters on the library bulletin board.

Roy Orbison was truly one of the greats. Check this out:
Seven Anecdotes from the Roy Orbison/Beatles Tour

Proof positive that we're not just flyover country.

This weekend Duluth Dylan Fest will commence.  Be there or be square.

I saw them my freshman year in college... a fun memory way back when.

First class shows for those who love live theater.

It's becoming a Northland tradition.

Looks interesting. Should we come with an appetite?

It's safer than snake-handling in Kentucky.

Throwback Thursday: Sometimes Even When You Don't Understand a Dylan Song You Can "Get It"

“I don't like the idea of 'understanding' a film. I don't believe that rational understanding is an essential element in the reception of any work of art. Either a film has something to say to you or it hasn't. If you are moved by it, you don't need to have it explained to you. If not, no explanation can make you moved by it.” ~Federico Fellini

There it is. This is what some people mean when they talk about art, whether music, poetry or a painting. It's like a joke; you shouldn't have to explain why the punch line was funny.

To this day I don't "get" Dylan's "Changing of the Guard," but it moves me every time I hear it, and remains one of my favorite Dylan songs. What's it all about, Alfie? The images connect with something inside like a series of dreams, rising up from a subconscious sea teeming with shimmering mysteries.

In his book The Dylanologists David Kinney devotes one chapter to the Lyrics Dissecters. These are the ones Fellini is calling out above. It's like Dylan's lyrics are a secret code to be cracked, if only we had an Enigma Machine.

People have the same problem with abstract art. "I don't get it" has been exclaimed in art museums and galleries all over the world.

"Ballad of a Thin Man" is another song that falls into this category, difficult to apprehend but one that definitely haunts. The opening bars on the piano send a chill through the room and the confounding imagery shocks and frightens. Something's happening, even if you don't know what it is. "You try so hard, but you don't understand," Dylan hisses.

The words and images can confuse, but when ignited there can be light, revealing the outlines of shapes and scenes that darkness conceals.

* * * *

For what it's worth, Duluth Dylan Fest is just around the corner. May will be here faster than you know it. The events are slated for May 17-24 this year. If you want to celebrate with us here in Dylan's home town, mark your calendars. There will be a birthday celebration on his 85th, May 24, in front of the house he grew up in. And there will be plenty of music... some of it you'll "get" with your head and some with your heart.

Meantime life goes on all around you. Be a part of it. 

Love Is Oneness

When Peter Yarrow (of Peter, Paul and Mary fame) performed here in Duluth in 2024, I believe everyone at The West Theatre was touched by his gentle spirit. He was dying of bladder cancer and a bit frail, but simultaneously thoughtful and kind. During the concert he made a comment that I felt was courageous for a Jewish man in these polarized and hostile times. He said that we all need to love one another, the Arab, the Jew and the Christian. I believe he was speaking truth into the Palestinian conflict specifically, but into all of the conflicts that divide us, whether by race, creed or gender.

This memory brought to mind another memory from near fifty years ago. There was a missionary family on furlough from their missionary service in Yemen. It was a large family and they were a musical family. They sang songs for us with a Middle Eastern cadence in a haunting minor key that feels both evocative and mysterious, like a story full of longing and hidden strength.   

One of the songs so touched me that I asked them to write the words for me, which I share with you now.

Love is oneness, oh how sweet

to obey this law;

The unlovely we may meet

need our love the more.

Make us one, oh Love, we plead,

With men’s sorrow and their need.

 

We are one in needing love,

let us true love show;

Only Love’s Son from above

makes our spirits grow.

Love us, this is our heart’s need,

Let us love and live indeed.

 

We are also one in this:

we must love or die.

Loving others is true bliss,

self-love is a lie.

Love of self is inward strife,

Love turned outward is true life.

 

Let us love and fruitful be,

love is God’s own breath;

Love will kindle love and see

new life born from death.

Nowhere is a heaven more sweet

than where loving spirits meet.

* * * 

 

May your holiday season include re-connecting 

with those who are important to you 

and with those who need you. 

Throwback Thursday: Music-Based Tourism and Placemaking in Dylan's Northland

Beacon Theater, Nov. 2018. Photo credit: Nelson French

A few years back, the Duluth News Tribune featured an update on the state of tourism here by Visit Duluth president & CEO Anna Tanski. I found this particular passage in the article uplifting:

Bob Dylan and outdoor adventure remain the two top draws for international media and visitors. In recent months, Visit Duluth has hosted travel writers, influencers and media/TV from Australia, China, Germany, Sweden, and the UK. Stories have started running and will continue well into 2019, shining the international spotlight on our city, hopefully spurring travelers to experience Duluth for themselves.

As a member of the Duluth Dylan Fest committee it has been gratifying to welcome some of these journalists and media folk. The list of visitors goes further than the nations cited in Anna Tanski's column. Duluth warmly welcomed a pair of Pakistani journalists this fall, one who called Duluth the Best Place for Meditation. In 2017 we had a visit from a Rolling Stone journalist from France. who greatly enjoyed standing before the stage where a young Robert Zimmerman stood when Buddy Holly performed here.

January 1, 1972. Academy of Music. Photo credit: Joseph Sia
Photo courtesy William Pagel Archives

This past October it was a treat to meet a team from the BBC who flew to Minnesota to cover the upcoming election. They were torn between Rochester and Duluth, but descended upon our city because one of the men was a Dylan fan. In covering the Northland they visited the John Bushey Studio at KUMD to interview Miriam, host of the Highway 61 Revisited program. From there they caught a few of us at Carmody's Irish Pub where the Duluth Dylan Fest team was finishing up a planning meeting. You can catch the dialogue here, approximately 40 minutes in.

I mention all these things because reading yesterday's article seemed to be a much needed public acknowledgement that Dylan's ties to the Northland have real value for the community, something that has not always been recognized. When I first moved to Duluth in 1986, efforts to create a Bob Dylan Way had been continuously thwarted. For decades. It wasn't until May 2006 that the City of Duluth designated a cultural pathway in honor of Duluth’s native son, Bob Dylan, to commemorate his 65th birthday. It still required a group of citizens to raise private dollars to create and install 30 street signs that mark this pathway.

WHY PLACEMAKING MATTERS

There is much that has been written about music-based tourism. One of the foremost scholars on this subject is David Leaver of Manchester, England, who twice visited the Northland as part of his research endeavors. Here are links to abstracts for a few of his papers.

Before They Were Famous: Music-Based Tourism and a Musicians Hometown Roots

Together Through Life—an exploration of popular music heritage and the quest for re-enchantment
Premise: Set against the backdrop of the historical shift from modernity into postmodernity, this article explores the growing importance of music destination tourism for the baby boomer generation in their quest for personal and social meaning.

'Tangled up in Bob': An ethnographic case study of the impact of local Bob Dylan heritage on place branding in Hibbing, Minnesota.
Abstract: This case study explores avenues for symbiotic co-branding of local music heritage sites in Hibbing, Minnesota, an isolated mining town with a strong local culture, where Bob Dylan grew up and lived from 1947 to 1959. Music heritage based tourism focusing on sites of biographical significance is a growth sector in countries with mature tourism and music industries, such as the US and the UK. Based on two field visits and correspondence, this ethnographic study applies ethnographic aims to generate an understanding of the perspectives and orientations of key Hibbing stakeholders. Issues of access to the field and the negotiation of multiple roles of the researcher as fan, observer and participator are discussed. Findings provide a holistic image of events, drivers and barriers and 'tell the story' of the contribution of Hibbing's Bob Dylan heritage towards a local sense of place. Building on the conceptualization of 'place brand' as a relational network which emerges as an ongoing interactive process between 'place' and all its stakeholders, the paper suggests ways in which Dylan's Hibbing heritage can both further attract and inform his fan base while recognizing local sensitivities and resources.

* * * *

London, England, 2009. Courtesy William Pagel Archives.

Writing for World Archaeology, Timothy Darvill's  Rock and soul: humanizing heritage, memorializing music and producing places offers these additional insights about music and place.
Place production through the formal process of ‘place-making’ and the more informal evolutionary expediency of ‘place-marking’ has become a major theme of sustainable development, conservation and regeneration in recent decades. Popular music heritage has played a part in this, and has great potential to contribute more. This article explores the ways in which tangible and intangible heritage combine to underpin place-production linked to popular music. Examples of the achievements of popular musical heritage in relation to three discernible kinds of place-production are explored: linear places epitomized by roads and routes such as Highway 61 and Route 66; dispersed places represented by memorial plaques and statues on buildings and in open spaces; and concentrations of connected elements such as can be found in Liverpool (UK) and Memphis (USA). It is concluded that popular music culture continues to have an important role to play in the creation of powerful places and that social conventions and commercial interests now contribute to the perpetuation of interest in these places and the traditions they represent.

Of course the references to Route 66 and Highway 61 especially jump out, having travelled portions of both, each laced with nostalgia dripping with Americana. It was a privilege to welcome a caravan of Airstreamers to Duluth this past September who had come to begin their own trek from the Northland here to New Orleans. (See: Airstreamers Arrive in Dylan Country.)

* * * *
It is exciting to see the progress being made in Hibbing and here in Duluth.
There's more to be said, but this is enough for now. The links below will take you further.

* * * *
Related Links

Bob Dylan In Minnesota Now Available: A Handy Tool for Music-Based Tourists

Bob Dylan Duluth Tour Flyer
Additional Links related to this theme
Serendipity, the Duluth Armory and a Dylan Fan (Journalist) from Germany

BONUS TRACK
On January 27 the Armory Arts and Music Center Presents a Tribute to the Music of Buddy Holly and the Late 50s. This event is a 60th Anniversary Reunion remembrance, to be held at the Sports Garden in Canal Park. Details Here.

Duluth Art Beat: AJ Atwater's One Day Fine Art Estate Sale Is April 12

Abstraction 30 -- 36"x 48"

IN TEN DAYS Duluth artist AJ Atwater will debut 130 New York City and Lake Superior original abstract acrylic paintings at the AJ Atwater Fine Art Estate Sale Saturday, April 12 from 11AM-4PM. AJ Atwater Art will be on display in six galleries at 4701 Cooke Street, Duluth. Atwater calls it "the cream of the cream" of her painting collection.

Here are a few of the pieces that will be on display. You can check out my interview with the artist here at the Duluth Reader website: AJ Atwater’s big canvas blowout: Duluth Meets Manhattan.

Fog -- 16"x 20"

Still Life with Oval -- 16"x 20"

Yellow Series 2 -- 24"x 30"

Red Series 6 -- 10"x 10"

Palisade Head -- 24"x 30"

The Artist: AJ Atwater

The more you engage, the more you see.

Sunshine and large windows make colors brght.

 

 “Lake Superior is my Manhattan” ~ AJ Atwater

Related Links

AJ Atwater and PROJECT 30/30 

Virtual Reality Meets Virtual Gallery: AJ Atwater's 400 Paintings

Sneak Preview: Kuth and Atwater's Affordable Fine Art Show

Where does the term Tenderloin District come from and what does it mean?

When our son got married, he and his bride moved to San Francisco, renting a small apartment in what was known as the Tenderloin District. He quickly found work within walking distance at a restaurant called Soluna where one of his sandwich creations became a menu item. 

When Susie and I visited (the following year?) the attraction of big city life was apparent. Everything you need is within walking distance. Big box retailers, eateries, City Lights Bookstore, night life--it was all around you. To the untrained eye it appeared to be thriving. 

This week I was doing research on a section of Duluth called Canal Park. To my surprise, there was also an area here called the Tenderloin District, and it made me curious.

The term originated in New York City. Purportedly, it was an area where police officers could afford to eat tenderloin steak using the bribes they collected from illegal activities there. Brothels, gambling dens and other forms of vice could all be found here. 

When similar characteristics begand to emerge in Frisco, the name was adopted, covering the area from Union Square to Van Ness and Market Sreet to Geary in the north. (While visiting stores on Market Street I watched some junkies across the street shooting up. They dispersed when one of the group noticed me observing.)

Duluth's vice trade was a well-known piece of Northland lore. Grandma's Saloon and Grill was formerly a brothel in this "red light" zone. Canal Park housed our own Tenderloin District. The term "tenderloin" refers to a choice cut of meat, a symbol of the wealth associated with illicit income from vice activities. Figuratively it signifies an area where one can indulge in forms of entertainment on the edge or beyond legal bounds.

One of the streets in Canal Park, called "Whiskey Row," purportedly had 22 saloons and brothels. The Twin Ports (Duluth and Superior) was one of the most active inland ports in the world, hence the preponderance of transient workers and sailors who these facilities catered to. 

For some eye-opening stories about vice and crooked cops, check out Nevada Bob Gordon's 50 Years with the Wrong Woman. 

Photo: Creative Commons 2.0 -- Flickr

Duluth Dylan Fest 2025: Schedule Announced

The tentative schedule for our 2025 Duluth's Dylan Fest is taking shape, celebrating Duluth's Native Son the week of his 84th birthday. This annual event is held during the week of May 24th, Bob's birthday, a feast of local friends and the extended family of fans from abroad, paying homage to one of the most influential singer-songwriters of our time.  

Whether you're a lifelong fan or a newcomer to Dylan's vast repertoire, Duluth Dylan Fest offers a unique opportunity to dive deeper into his music, explore the city where he was born, and experience the community that continues to celebrate his enduring legacy. 

The activities are evolving. Here’s what you can look forward to in this year's current schedule of events:

Duluth Dylan Fest 2025

Duluth Dylan Fest will be held May 19-25, 2025. Please note times and locations are subject to change. Watch for updates for ticketed event links. The festival line-up includes:

 

Sunday, May 18, 2025

Hibbing Day – More details to come (Hibbing High School Tour and

Birthday Celebration on the lawn of Bob Dylan’s Boyhood Home.

 

Monday, May 19, 2025

 

Dylan Fest Acoustic Jam Session with host Leslie Black

Bring your voice and/or instrument and music stand.

Carmody Irish Pub

308 East Superior Street, Duluth

5:30-8:30 PM | Free

 

Thursday, May 22, 2025

 

Duluth Dylan Fest Dance Party with Cowboy Angel Blue

Mr. D’s Bar and Grill

5622 Grand Avenue, Duluth

7:00-10:00 PM | Free

 

Friday, May 23, 2025

 

Dylan Fest Singer-Songwriter Contest

Sacred Heart Music Center

2022 4th Street, Duluth

7:00-10:00 PM | Tickets TBD

 

Saturday, May 24, 2025

 

Bob Dylan Front Porch Birthday Party with live music

Bob Dylan’s childhood home

519 N. 3rd Ave. East, Duluth

11:00-12:30 PM | Free

 

John Bushey Memorial Lecture

Location TBD

1:30–3:00 PM | Free

 

Highway 61 Revisited Radio Show

The North 103.3 FM, Streaming online at 5:00-6:00 PM | Free

Sheltering from the Storm Concert

Sacred Heart Music Center

2022 4th Street, Duluth

7:00-10:00 PM | Tickets TBD

  

Sunday, May 25, 2025

 

Farewell Brunch featuring Live Music

Location TBD

11:00 AM -12:30 PM | Free (Brunch not included)

FOR LATEST SCHEDULE UPDATES:

Duluth Dylan Fest 2025 – Duluth Dylan Fest

Related Links

Music-Based Tourism and Placemaking in Dylan's Northland

The Case for Celebrating Dylan's Home Town

A Duluth Time Capsule Goes on Display at the Karpeles Manuscript Museum

The metal container after being pried open.

If you've never been present at the opening of a time capsule, then you are missing something special. The idea of it has to be fun, from deciding what to save for posterity to wondering what's inside when people open it up decades later.

This past Saturday Karpeles Manuscript Library Museum opened a time capsule that had been placed beneath the cornerstone of the former church building that now houses the museum. At the time, this had been the home for a Church of Christ, Scientist congregation that gathered here.

For those unfamiliar with this Duluth treasure, the Manuscript Library Museum is one of many around the country. This one, however, is unique because it's located in the town where David Karpeles graduated high school, Denfeld in Duluth West Side.

I heard about the time capsule only by chance last week. With a little free time on my hands I dropped in to see what the current themes were on dislay. Two of the featured exhibits were Florence Nightingale and the event that generated the famous poem "Charge of the Light Brigade." While there, local museum director Matthew Sjelin notified me of the weekend event.

I found the story intriguing because in 2007 I attended the opening of a time capsule in Tulsa, Oklahoma. A gold and white 1957 Plymouth Belvedere had been placed in a concrete vault that was to be opened in 2007. Boyd Coddington, an L.A. car-builder with a television show was on hand to help get the car started after its 50 year sleep. Inside the trunk were the "time capsule" contents.

So I was curious about the contents that had been hidden since 1912. First off, the container--a metal box--was smaller than I expected, but based on the quantity of books it contained the thing was really packed. A book of poetry by Mary Baker Eddy was one item that caught my eye. There were also newspapers from the day it was placed, as well as photos, Christian Science Journals, Bibles, letters and a sheet with signatures of all members of the congregation.

Here are some of the items they placed in the vault for posterity:

Related Links

Treasures of the Karpeles Manuscript Library Museum

The History of Medicine @ Karpeles

Time Capsules: What Would You Conceal For 100 Years?

Christa Lawler's Account of the Treasures at Karpeles in Duluth

        The Minnesota Star Tribune, 28 Sept 2024