My Bob Dylan pilgrimage

On March 25, Bob Dylan delivered his first performance of the year in Tulsa, Oklahoma, as his “Rough and Rowdy Ways” tour enters its fourth year running. At 83 years old, there was no guarantee Dylan would keep performing live.

At the start of the year, there were no new dates listed on his website. Then, in early January, one performance popped up. The show was to be held at the Tulsa Theater – an important location for the performer, as the city is home to the Bob Dylan Center, located in the downtown art district. Tulsa also has a reputation as a musical destination through which almost every legendary folk, rock, country and blues artist has toured. Dylan is no exception.

Following the success (both box office and critical) of the Oscar-nominated film A Complete Unknown – in which a young Dylan is played by Timothée Chalamet – the demand to see the “voice of a generation” perform live has increased. But with only a single date listed at the start of the year, would Tulsa be our last and only chance? I couldn’t take the risk.

As a New York native and longtime Dylan fan living in south Florida, I’ve had plenty of chances to see him over the years, but I never did. I was dissuaded by some self-proclaimed Dylanologists who advised me his live show wasn’t good anymore, that he didn’t have the chops he had a half-century ago. A naive fool, I took their advice.

But when I saw that tickets to his Tulsa Theater gig were going on sale in late January, I decided this was my moment: I would make the journey to Oklahoma. My wife Michelle, who isn’t a Dylan fan (she prefers Neil Young), wasn’t interested in joining me. Instead, she gave me her blessing. “Give this to yourself as a birthday gift,” she said, as my birthday would be the day after the concert. My thumb was quick off the mark, prodding away at my smartphone, and I managed to grab one of the last tickets available seconds after they went on sale.

Nearly two months later, with plane tickets and hotel booked, I was ready to spend 24 hours in Tulsa, a city I’d never visited. It has a difficult but rich past: it weathered the 1921 Tulsa race massacre and the Dust Bowl of the 1930s, and produced musical legends including Leon Russell and Woody Guthrie. I couldn’t wait to touch down.

When I landed I hit the ground running, visiting both the Bob Dylan Center and the Woody Guthrie Center as soon as they opened. The exhibits featured instruments, records, photographs, film and artwork connected to the musicians. It felt like Disneyland for music lovers.

In the afternoon, as I walked around downtown Tulsa, admiring its ornate 19th- and 20th-century architecture, it must have been clear I was an outsider, but was shown plenty of warmth and hospitality in the Deco Deli, on the ground floor of the Atlas Life Building, listed in the US National Register of Historic Places. My Uber drivers acted like unofficial tour guides as they drove me across the city.

And then there was Bob Dylan. I was so nervous about finally seeing him live, the one beer I drank nearly sent me over the edge. At this point I was sleep-deprived, but my excitement kept me going, as did the couple sitting next to me. They were Tulsa natives who proudly told stories about the theater’s former life as an opera house. They kindly nudged me when I nearly dozed off right before the show began.

The lights dimmed and the crowd roared as Dylan walked on stage. Every one of us gave him a standing ovation as his band took their positions.

Wearing a black rimmed hat and sitting at his piano center stage, Dylan delivered what felt like an intimate performance for thousands of us. We heard songs that spanned his career, including “All Along the Watchtower,” “It Ain’t Me Babe,” “Key West (Philosopher Pirate),” “It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue,” “I Contain Multitudes,” and “Desolation Row.” I had to pinch myself. It felt like I was watching history play out in front of me.

The next morning, still in a daze from the night before, I sat in the airport speaking to some locals about their great city and my concert the night before. The same question kept coming up again and again as I headed home: why it had taken me so long to seek out the extraordinary?

This article was originally published in The Spectator’s June 2025 World edition.