- Robert Shelton (critic)
Robert Shelton (
June 28 ,1926 ,Chicago, Illinois ,United States –December 11 ,1995 ,Brighton, England ) was a music and film critic.Shelton's most enduring claim to fame was that he helped launch the career of a then unknown 20-year-old folk singer named
Bob Dylan . Dylan was performing atGerdes Folk City inGreenwich Village the ne-plus-ultra ofNew York City folk venues, opening for a bluegrass act called the Greenbriar Boys. Shelton's positive review brought crucial publicity to Dylan, which led to a Columbia recording contract and aPeter, Paul and Mary cover of "Blowin' in the Wind ".Shelton was born and raised in Chicago, Illinois, He served in
US Army inFrance during 1944-45 and then attended the School ofJournalism atNorthwestern University . He moved to New York in the 1950s, joining the staff of theNew York Times not long after. For a decade (1958-1968), Shelton reviewed music, in particularfolk music , but also pop andcountry music , becoming a good friend of many of the artists and extending his influence beyond the pages of the "Times". His other work included writing the programs at theNewport Folk Festival ; and doing album notes for several artists, including Dylan, as "Stacey Williams." During the early 1960s, he co-edited a magazine, "Hootenanny", at the same time his friendLinda Solomon edited a different magazine titled "ABC-TV Hootenanny".Shelton spent decades writing and rewriting his Dylan opus, "No Direction Home, The Life and Music of Bob Dylan" which was published in 1986. The title is taken from the lyric of a Dylan song, "Like a Rolling Stone", from the "
Highway 61 Revisited " album. The title of Shelton's biography of Dylan was borrowed byMartin Scorsese for his 2005 film about Dylan's early career. Other books include "Electric Muse: The Story Of Folk Into Rock" and "The Face of Folk Music".In 1982 Shelton moved to Brighton, England, where he wrote mostly about films for a number of publications up to the time of his death. Much of the collection of his early work has been donated to the
University of Liverpool .Books
*"No Direction Home: The Life and Music of Bob Dylan", 1986, Da Capo Press reprint 2003, ISBN 0-306-81287-8
External links
* [http://users2.ev1.net/~smyth/linernotes/articles/MitchellTrio/MitchellTrio.htm Introduction to "The Mitchell Trio Song Book", 1964]
* [http://www.bobdylanroots.com/shelton.html Robert Shelton with music criticLinda Solomon in 1964]
* [http://users2.ev1.net/~smyth/linernotes/articles/Hootenanny/Hootenany.htm Robert Shelton on theKingston Trio ]
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