Bob Dylan in concert 1962. The final entry in the concert series (for now)

Posted on January 22, 2026 by Tony Attwood

 

By Tony Attwood

So with this recording of a concert in Montreal, on 2 July 1962 we come to the end of the series, searching for a concert, or something akin to that, each year from 1961 to 2025.   If I remember, later this year I will add a concert from 2026, and of course if anyone does come up with a recording from any of the missing years, I’ll be delighted to add it, although believe me I have searched.

But for now, here is 1962 – although a word of warning – the harmonica playing isn’t always of the quality we have later come to expect.  And the tuning and re-tuning can be a bit of a pain.

However, I would also add that Bob seems to be suffering from a fair amount of nerves at the start.  Go to the end of the recording, and you will find him in full control, really delivering the songs with the sort of gusto that we have got to know across the years.

The set list has, as ever, been noted by www.setlist.fm to whom I have turned throughout this series whenever there has been a song (for example, a cover of someone else’s work) whose title I have no recognised.

Of this concert, clearly played in front of just a very small audience, the one thing we can say is, “polished it isn’t” – although do stay with it, because it really does get more together as it goes along.

The intro to Blowin in the Wind is particularly interesting – it really does seem as if Bob doesn’t realise he has written one of the all-time great songs of the century.  At this moment of performance, it is just another song.

And even if the lower quality of the first three songs isn’t to your taste, I would urge you to skip forward to 16 minutes 20 seconds and enjoy what must be one of the earliest extant recordings of the aforementioned “Blowin in the Wind”.

And indeed from there on the concert really does have some wonderful moments from that point on as Bob seems to have warmed up.  Why Bob has such tuning problems, I don’t know, but it is still a great archive recording to have.

  1. The Death of Emmett Till
  2. Stealin’, Stealin’
  3. Hiram Hubbard
  4. Blowin’ in the Wind
  5. Rocks and Gravel
  6. Quit Your Low Down Ways
  7. He Was a Friend of Mine
  8. Let Me Die in My Footsteps
  9. Two Trains Running
  10. Ramblin’ on My Mind
  11. Blue Yodel No. 8 (Mule Skinner’s Blues)

I do hope you have enjoyed any parts of this series you have listened to, just a fraction as much as I have enjoyed putting it together.

Previous concerts covered in this series

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