Music legend Bob Dylan’s entire catalogue of 600 songs sold for £230million
MUSIC legend Bob Dylan’s entire catalogue of songs has been sold for around £230million.
The veteran US songwriter, 79, handed over the rights to 600 tracks — including classics Blowin’ In The Wind and Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door.
Financial terms of the mega-bucks deal with Universal Music Publishing Group — struck directly with Dylan — were not disclosed.
However, the New York Times revealed it was worth at least £225million.
Universal CEO Sir Lucian Grainge said yesterday: “Brilliant and moving, inspiring and beautiful, insightful and provocative, his songs are timeless — whether they were written more than half a century ago or yesterday.”
Born Robert Zimmerman, Dylan burst on to the folk scene in the early 1960s before controversially picking up an electric guitar on stage in 1965.
He has sold more than 125million records and was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2016 — the first songwriter to receive such a distinction.
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His songs have been covered more than 6,000 times by artists including The Jimi Hendrix Experience and Guns N’ Roses.
The value of owning music rights has soared amid a surge in streaming.
Dylan has not commented on the rights sale.
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