the unseen photos of Joe Alper 1961-1965 dylan before dylan Wall of sound gallery dylan before 16.05 | 21.07.13 dylan for the first time, A europeAn exclusive, the unseen photos of Joe Alper 1961-1965 Wall Of SOund Gallery This exhibition is included Cristina Pelissero in the City of Alba’s event “Primavera di Bellezza” Via Gastaldi, 4 12051 Alba (CN), Italy +39-0173-362324 [email protected] ©2013 Wall Of Sound Gallery / HRR Edizioni www.wallofsoundgallery.com The Joe Alper Photo Collection LLC Graphic design: Hours: Tuesday / Saturday GUIDO HARARI e ANNA FOSSATO 10.30-12.30 / 15.30-19.30 Sunday 15.30-19.30 Acknowledgments: EDWARD ELBERS and the JOE ALPER PHOTO Closed monday COLLECTION LLC, GEORGE ALPER, LEN CHARNEY, ERIC PERSON for starting the ball, DONALD PERSON Press office: for saving the show from shipwrecking. clarart Claudia Ratti +39-039-2721502 This catalogue cannot be reproduced in whole or in part [email protected] in any form without the written authorization of the www.clarart.com copyright owners and publisher. 1. Celebrating the 50th anniversary of Blowin’ in the Wind Wall Of Sound Gallery is proud to present, for ditions. At the time the Village is also one of a the first time ever and as a European exclusive, few interracial melting pots. the “DYLAN BEFORE DYLAN” exhibition with the Being a huge fan of Woody Guthrie, the great historic photographs by Joe Alper. folk legend who’s dying at the Brooklyn State Like last year with the Art Kane show, the edit- Hospital, Dylan sports a business card that says ing, the restoration of the original negatives as “I ain’t dead yet”, signed WG. But, as his friends well as the printing have been made at our gal- way back in Minneapolis would say, he’s stand- lery, in Alba, with the loving supervision of Ed- ing at the same mystic crossroads where they ward Elbers, manager of the Joe Alper Photo say thirty years earlier Robert Johnson has sold Collection LLC. his soul to the Devil in order to become a music genius. How could you explain otherwise Dylan’s May 1961. Bob Dylan barely turned 20 and has stunning metamorphosis when, during the same arrived in New York four months earlier. After Spring, he’ll return home for a brief visit, with roaming all around America, from his native a surprisingly new voice and a sudden mastery Minnesota through Iowa, South Dakota, Kansas, with the guitar? North Dakota, New Mexico, and taking on an un- Truth is, that time had erased every trace of his specified number of identities (“You can go any- past and the future is just pure imagination. “I where when you’re somebody else”), he starts didn’t have a past to talk about, nothing to go building a reputation in the folk clubs of the back to, nobody to count on”, Dylan says to di- Greenwich Village, like Gerde’s Folk City. Since rector Martin Scorsese in his No Direction Home the Twenties the Village has become the mecca film. “Only folk music could communicate to me Opposite and next page: for any bohemian, poet, artist and misfit look- something that was in synch with my feelings Newport Folk Festival, 1963. ing for freedom from conventions and bad tra- towards life, people, institutions, ideologies. financial situation. Unfortunately a more seri- ous problem is looming large: his battle, just begun, with ADPKD is bound to end tragically with his death in just a few years, in 1968. At that time everything that counted for Alper often follows Dylan with his camera, at ure in the Village’s folk scene), Joe Alper re- me was learning as many folk songs as the Indian Neck Folk Festival in 1961 or more ally records a “Dylan before Dylan” with possible, but the majority of the people north, in January 1962, at Caffe Lena or at the simplicity and immediacy. The same can be I knew thought it was stuff from the San Remo in Schenectady. On these occasions said of when, in April 1962, Alper gives a Dylan will gladly stay at the Alper’s house in ride with his car to Dylan going to Columbia past, really archaic. I don’t know why, Miles Davis, Duke Ellington and Ella Fit- Brandywine Avenue. Therefore the historic Studios for his first recording session for but to me it seemed that those songs zgerald, Dizzy Gillespie with Quincy value of Joe’s photos of Dylan at this early what will become The Freewheelin’ Bob Dy- were nailing the present better than Jones, Ray Charles in a rare image of stage in his career is invaluable, not only be- lan album, the one that features Blowin’ in anything else”. him soloing on tenor sax, Charlie Mingus cause they record fundamental passages, from the Wind. In the same month of May 1961, in Bran- with Max Roach, Howlin’ Wolf, Joe Za- his first steps until the electric revolution at Although never exhibited before, some of ford, Connecticut, where Dylan is due to winul, Mississippi John Hurt and Eliza- Newport 1965, but most of all because they these images have been seen by the general perform at the Montowese Hotel, there’s beth Cotton, Big Joe Williams. Alper’s show an artist in progress, informally, without public as they’ve been featured on Dylan’s also a photographer waiting for him. camera makes the intensity of these art- the masks he’s already wearing in the same pe- The Witmark Demos: 1962 and 1964 album as His name is Joe Alper. 37 years old, a ists’ performances and their magnetism riod when posing for other photographers like well as in Scorsese’s No Direction Home film jazz and folk fan, Alper is already shoot- palpable, capturing them in a dimension Barry Feinstein, David Gahr, Ted Russell or and related soundtrack album booklet. ing a variety of important record covers that – be it the stage of the first big folk John Cohen. Captured in an unusual domestic This exhibition, which showcases over 50 for artists like John Coltrane, Charlie and jazz festivals of the time, or the bliss, often with his fiancée Suze Rotolo (the photographs printed in various sizes from Mingus and Pete Seeger, but never fails aseptic intimacy of a recording studio same immortalized by Don Hunstein on the cov- 11x14 to 30x40, is made even more precious to shoot and support, with a fervor – seems even more miraculously friendly er of the Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan album), or with a selection of images, also historic and shared with his wife Jackie, the young and livable. This is a unique record of playing with constructions with Alper’s kids, or rarely seen, of some jazz, blues and folk upcoming folkies that get to perform in an unrepeatable era when, as Dylan puts singing for Pete Seeger and an asleep Rev. Gary greats like Aretha Franklin, Nina Simone, the local clubs and cafes, like the his- it, “the performers I saw and I wanted Davis at Gil Turner’s wedding (another key fig- Muddy Waters, Thelonious Monk, Joan Baez toric Caffe Lena in Sarasota Springs. to be shared the same thing: it was in with her sister Mimi and her husband Rich- The Alper’s are in the right milieu. Jack- their eyes and it seemed to want to say: ard Farina, Pete Seeger, John Coltrane in the ie works as secretary to the legendary ‘We know something that you don’t recording studio with producer Bob Thiele, ethnomusicologist Alan Lomax and, like know’. That’s the kind of performer I Joe, is a close friend of Pete Seeger, an- wanted to be”. other hero of folk music and civil con- science. Joe has only recently devoted GUIDO HARARI, Wall Of Sound Gallery himself to photography, certainly to fol- low his passion for music, but also hop- ing to find a way out from his dramatic 2. Ramblin’ outa the wild West, Leavin’ the towns I love the best. Thought I’d seen some ups and down, ‘Til I come into New York town. People goin’ down to the ground, Buildings goin’ up to the sky. BOB DYLAN, Talkin’ New York. 3. 4. 8. 5. 6. 7. 9. 10. 11. 13. 12. 14. 15. 17. 18. 16. 21. 19. 20. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29. ... and all that jazz, blues, folk... 33. 31. 34. 30. 32. 36. 35. 37. 38. 39. 40. 43. 41. 42. 44. 45. 46. 47. 49. 48. 50. 52. 51. 53. CAPTIONS TO PHOTOS 01. 13. 20. 32. 41. 50. BOB DYLAN writing songs at the Alper’s house, 520 Bran- BOB DYLAN plays with constructions with Joe Alper’s son BOB DYLAN at Turner’s wedding. Sitting, at the fore- MAX ROACH and CHARLIE MINGUS, Newport Jazz Festival, MILES DAVIS, Newport Jazz Festival, 1966. JOHN COLTRANE recording the John Coltrane And Johnny dywine Avenue (second floor), Schenectady, NY, January GEORGE, Jan. 13, 1962. front, is PETE SEEGER. 1962. Hartman, 1963. 1962. 42. 14. 22. 25. 26. 33. SONNY ROLLINS, 1961. 51. 02. BOB DYLAN in concert at the Caffe San Remo, BOB DYLAN in the Columbia Studios recording The Fre- THELONIOUS MONK, Newport Jazz Festival, 1965. PETE SEEGER at his house, 1961. BOB DYLAN, Indian Neck Folk Festival, May 6, 1961. Schenectady, NY, January 1962. ewheelin’ Bob Dylan, 1962. 43. 34. ROLAND KIRK, Newport Jazz Festival, 1962. 52. 03. 04. 15. 23. 24. MISSISSIPPI JOHN HURT and ELIZABETH COTTEN, PETE SEEGER, Newport Folk Festival, 1965. BOB DYLAN at the Alper’s house, Sept.