A working manuscript of two Bob Dylan songs from Blood on the Tracks, handwritten during the spring of 1974 at his Minnesota farm, is being offered at auction. The lot includes a double-sided sheet with working lyrics for "Idiot Wind" and "You're Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go," plus a separate notebook page on which Ellen Bernstein, then known as Ellen Ziffren, says she transcribed the latter song when Dylan first played it for her.
The lot, listed by RR Auction, had drawn a bid of $174,546 as of press time, according to the Minnesota Star Tribune. The sale closes September 24. Bernstein was 24 when she met Dylan at a party thrown by Bill Graham in Sausalito in 1974, shortly before becoming San Francisco director of artists and repertoire for Columbia Records, according to music historian Anne Margaret Daniel. She later worked with acts including Santana, Boz Scaggs and Shel Silverstein.
A Song Bernstein Believes Was Written for Her
Bernstein says the manuscript's separate notebook page records her transcription of "You're Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go" on the day Dylan first played it for her, according to the auction listing. She also told the Star Tribune that she believes the song was inspired by their relationship. That interpretation is Bernstein's claim, not an established account of the song's subject.
The song has often been read within Blood on the Tracks' breakup narrative. Bernstein disputes that reading and says the song was about her instead. She points to the lyric's reference to Ashtabula, Ohio, which she connects to trips they took together.
What the Buyer Would Own
The sale concerns the physical manuscript, not necessarily the copyright in the words. According to the U.S. Copyright Office, owning an original lyric sheet is distinct from owning the copyright in the lyrics, so the sale of the paper alone does not transfer copyright rights for reproduction, publication or commercial licensing. The office also says copyright ownership may be transferred by conveyance. If a historically important manuscript enters a public archive, preservation and discovery become separate parts of the process. Stanford University Libraries describes a separate example in which fragile pencil music manuscripts were donated for preservation, while the University of Illinois Archives says collections are arranged and described under the supervision of professional archivists to support research access.
The lot is also one piece of a much larger body of Dylan material. The Bob Dylan Center says it is the primary public venue for a collection of more than 100,000 items, including handwritten manuscripts, notebooks and correspondence. Unlike an auction lot that changes hands privately, institutional holdings can be organized and described for research; the University of Illinois Archives says that process is conducted under the supervision of professional archivists.
Dylan made all decisions about the album's changes himself, and Bernstein has said she provided input on the record but did not attend the December re-recording sessions.
From Bernstein's Folder to the Auction Block
Bernstein kept the manuscripts in a folder along with two letters Dylan wrote her in the mid-to-late 1980s, the Star Tribune reports. She helped make arrangements for the album's original New York recording sessions that September, and was later introduced to biographer Clinton Heylin, who interviewed her for his 1991 biography, Dylan: Behind the Shades. Bernstein quit the music business in 1980. She says she last communicated with him at a charity dinner roughly 15 years before her interview with the Star Tribune.
These days, Bernstein works with Stand Up To Cancer and is developing an initiative with chef Andrew Zimmern to help food-service workers in addiction recovery, according to the Star Tribune. She says she's selling the lyrics now to help fund a college fund for her 7-year-old granddaughter.
Why the Manuscript Ended Up in Minnesota
Dylan wrote the songs that became Blood on the Tracks at his farm near Minnesota, but the album's road to release ran through two very different studios. He first recorded the album in New York in September 1974, then re-recorded five of its ten tracks in Minneapolis that December. The finished 1975 release, per Engelsberg Ideas, split evenly between five songs cut at A&R Studios in New York and five re-recorded at Sound 80 studio in Minneapolis.
How This Sale Compares to Past Dylan Auctions
The Bob Dylan Center holds two Blood on the Tracks notebooks.
The current record for a Dylan lyric manuscript was set when a handwritten copy of Like a Rolling Stone sold for approximately $2 million at a New York auction in 2014, the Guardian separately reported. Bernstein's Blood on the Tracks lot, still climbing past $174,000 with bidding open through Thursday, offers collectors a rare, handwritten window into how one of Dylan's most celebrated albums took shape between a Minnesota farmhouse and two very different recording studios.
