Two from the New York
Two from the New York Times: first, Dylan returns to the Newport festival:
On that Sunday evening in July, with society's walls rattling, Pete Seeger introduced the final slate of performers by suggesting that they sing as if serenading a newborn baby, to tell it what kind of world they wanted it to inherit. In short order, Dylan mounted the stage wearing a black leather jacket, backed by members of the Paul Butterfield Blues Band, and, with the sound system cranked up to ear-splitting level, he opened with "Maggie's Farm" ("I try my best to be just like I am/ But everybody wants you to be just like them"), from "Bringing It All Back Home."
It was probably not the message Seeger had in mind for the baby; according to some accounts, he first threatened to cut the sound cables, then walked out. Alan Lomax, the folklorist who had recorded Woody Guthrie and Jelly Roll Morton for the Library of Congress, fumed and hollered, insisting that the volume be turned down, to no avail.
...and speaking of Lomax (again)...
Lomax started his work in the 1930's at a juncture when technology was perfectly double-edged, promising both salvation and destruction for local traditions. Salvation because the music could be recorded and then, conceivably, broadcast. And destruction because radio was breaking down the isolation of local styles on the way to promoting music that reached for a pop common denominator. Then World War II exposed people thrown together by military service to formerly isolated regional music; it also made America re-examine its identity and its folk heritage.
Recording and broadcasting were already changing the role of music from a live local event, demanding participation, to a commodity created by distant professionals, made for passive consumption. Lomax envisioned the relentless spread of a centralized pop that would erase eons of tradition. "We of the jets, the wireless and the atom blast," he wrote, "are on the verge of sweeping completely off the globe what unspoiled folklore is left."