This interview was done in 1993, first time Jack Elliott came to Italy since the 50s. Is very hard to interview this man: he never stop talkin’... but thats the way he is such a great man. We could have go on for hours, but some spaghetti were on the table...

The talk about him and Bob Dylan singin’ together Mr. Tambourine Man, at that time, was completely new…

(Published on the american magazine On The Tracks. Thanx to Chris Marcum as always)

I was 19, Woody was 39.

I met him when I went to see him in the hospital. I called him up on the telephone. I had a friend who played guitar with Woody, Tom Petty. I knew Tom for four years and we played a lot of things together. One day he said, "I’m going to go see Woody Guthrie and we’re going to play at Woody’s house and have a party over there." When I asked to come along, he said, "I’ll tell you what, I’ll give you the phone number, you call him, he’s a friendly guy, you just tell him about yourself."

Later I called him up on the phone and I said, "Hey, my name is Buck Elliott and I play guitar with Tom Petty and I’ve heard your records and I like your music." He said, "Well, why don’t you come over and visit me one of these days, Buck, and bring your git-tar?" (He talked like that.) "But don’t come today because I got a bellyache and I’m not feeling good."

I waited a couple days and I called him up again. When his wife answered, I said, "Is Woody there, please?". "No Woody is in the hospital. He has appendicitis," she said. "Oh, no, no, he’s ill." She explained that he was getting pain medicine and wasn’t himself.

So I waited two more days and I went to the hospital. I just went. I didn’t call him. I was looking around and I saw this little guy who had black, curly hair. He was looking crazy. I went over and I said, "Woody??". "That’s my name", he said. "I’m Jack Elliott. I called you on the telephone the other day. You want to hear a little music? I’ll play you some guitar," I said. "You better not do that. The guy in the bed over there is God-awful-he just got an operation-you better not make any noise."

So I couldn’t play the guitar. I was just standing there, listening to him go on. He was saying, "You know I’m married? Look out that window, you can look across the street and see my house, see my kids, they are playing out there, two boys, one girl. You’ll have to go over to the house and visit them."

So after I visited Woody, I went to his house and introduced myself. "I’m Buck Elliott. I’m the guy that called on the telephone. I just visited Woody and he told me to cover over here and say hello to you." "Well, come in. Come in," his wife said. It was a small apartment, a nice little place. So that’s how I met Woody, that was the first time. Then I had to go up to Connecticut to see my friend Eric Von Schmidt. He plays guitar and he is a painter. His father is a famous old cowboy, a hell of a bunch. When I visited Eric, there was a big party there in Westport and a friend of mine was going to California. He said, "Hey, Xerxes, do you want to help me drive this car out to California?" They called me by a different name in Connecticut. I had a different name in every state. (Jack chuckles) I had one guitar. I think I had a toothbrush. I don’t think I had any razor or shaving things, no clean clothes, nothing-just the guitar and the toothbrush. "Yeah, why not? Let’s go,". I said.

I put the guitar in the car and we took off. It was a 1937 Plymouth Coupe. We drove eight days going fifty miles an hour. It was a beautiful trip, perfect. (Jack goes on in great detail about getting into a car wreck in which the car flipped and flamed. He also tells about going over Donner Pass which was still a gravel road and had 16 feet of snow on both sides.) When we got to California I ended up at a museum where I got work restoring old sailing ships.

Yes, I’m a singer, but the first time I met Eric was on a sailboat that was going around the world. A 75-foot old Belgium sail boat. He was sitting on the plank with his paintbrush repainting the name (of the boat) on the stern. We were going to go around the world with Captain Dodd on this big boat. But they wanted you to pay $2000 to be in the crew. We didn’t have the money so we got off the ship.

Now later on, I’d been to California, I called up Woody again, "Hey, Woody, this is Buck Elliott; I just got back from California. I been singing Hard Traveling in every bar on Route 40."

He said, "Well, come on over. I’m gonna play a party tonight in Greenwich Village."

You mean, how was he known by the population? He was especially well known in certain areas by people who were politically aware and cared about what was happening in the government. Also intellectual people and people who really appreciated good art knew all about Woody Guthrie. But the average people didn’t know about Woody Guthrie at all. Because when I was traveling around with my guitar, hitchhiking everywhere, I’d get in the car and people would ask what kind of music I played. I told them I played folk music. "Oh, you mean like Burl Ives," they said. "No, I play like Woody Guthrie," I said. "Woody who...?"(Jack laughs)

But there were some places, like in New York, Chicago and Los Angeles, where they all knew about Woody Guthrie. Woody Guthrie was great.

One time I was in England and I met this American actor in a pub. He asked me, "You know Woody?" I told him I did. The actor said, "You know one day I was walking in the parade and Woody Guthrie was in the parade and he had his guitar and somebody asked, ‘Hey, who is that guy with that guitar?’ I said, ‘That’s Woody Guthrie and he can march in any parade he wants to!"

I feel very, very good. But I think it would be nice to have a big diesel bus to travel in because it is difficult when you’re traveling in airplanes, taxicabs and trains and buses and all that stuff. It gets old. The traveling gets tiresome. But the audiences are wonderful. And when young people want to know about things and want to hear some stories, it is so good to look into your eyes and see people who are interested and want to know about something that I can share-so that keeps me going. Otherwise I could spend the next 25 years just fishing or sailing the South Pacific. I love sailing and being near nature.

Cities are exciting for doing business but not healthy-all the smoke and crowds. It would be nice to live a quiet life doing some writing. So there is that kind of tension between desire for just peace and rest. Then there is this wonderful excitement that people have about the world and what is still going on. And there are people who still care about good things. They want to know about what somebody did, what did they say, how did this work out, how did you manage? It makes me feel useful to answer their questions.

Yes.

Not at all.

I was in Greenwich Village in the old days, 1951-52 and ‘53. And even in ‘61, ‘62 and ‘63, when I came back from Europe, it was marvelous. It was almost like a Renaissance was happening. Bob Dylan was there along with Peter, Paul and Mary and Dave Van Ronk. That was a very exciting time. No one slept. I drank a lot of red wine and ate spaghetti. How is Greenwich Village now, is something happening?

Ah, yeah, pop songs. Not new folk songs, like Butch Hancock or Bob Dylan. No one is writing new songs.

Well, I think it’s going to happen. Yeah, I think so, I can feel it. I don’t know why, I can’t say. There is something in the air.

Yes, more than I can tell you.

Yes, Bob invited me to come to his recording session (the Another Side session,). I was there and I was just sitting around and he was recording these songs. He was reading most of his songs he had on the paper in front of him because he only wrote the songs yesterday or the day before.

He said, "Hey Jack, sing one with me?"

"What is it?" I asked.

"It’s called Tambourine Man, Dylan said.

"I’ve heard that--you got the words?" I asked.

"Na, I know this one," he said. He’d written it a month before and memorized it. I said I didn’t know it. I only knew the chorus. I’d heard the song one time.

"Well help me out, you know the chorus," he said. So I sang the chorus. Then he got to the next verse, I shut up, he sang and I came in on "Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man..."

When we’d finished I said, "That’s not a very good rendition, it’s not very good, I’m sorry."

"No, it’s ok. You did good, Jack," Dylan said.

Later they came to put this record together--the song didn’t go on the record. So I thought, "Too bad, that’s the way life is. Sometimes things don’t work out. I did the best I could."

About a year later I was in California with my friend Jim Dixon. He was managing a band called the Byrds. I learned he was in New York one day and he was listening to some Bob Dylan tapes and he heard our tape of Mr. Tambourine Man. Dixon said, "Hey, that’s a good song, I like that." He took that tape out to California where he made a copy of it and he taught it to the Byrds. They learned Mr. Tambourine Man from that tape. And they did it just the way Bob and I sang it.

Even to this day I have never heard the tape. I keep meaning to write Jim Dixon a letter, you know, "Dear Jim, please send me a copy of the tape." Ií’m always too busy. It’s very hard for me to find time to write letters.

Yes, I also got that story from Roger McGuinn.

He was singing in a little club in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. I went there just to see him because he had a show at the hotel. We got to the hotel late. He was downstairs in the dressing room having a glass of wine with the club owner and having a nice time after the show.

"Hello, we just got here. I am sorry we missed the show. We’ve been driving all the way from Montana," I said to McGuinn.

"Ah, that’s ok, you want to hear a song?" McGuinn said.

"Oh, you’re tired," I said.

"No, I’m not tired."

"Would you play me a song?" I asked.

"Anything you want to hear, anything."

"Would you do that song about the mare, about the wild horse?"

"Sure." He played the song.

"Now," he said, "Jack, would you do me a favor? Will you sing a song with me?"

"If I know it," I said. I didn’t know Roger’s material. He does a lot of weird songs. "What do you want me to do?" I asked.

"Mr. Tambourine Man,"Roger said.

"Oh..."I said, ë"Roger, I have never learned that song. I don’t know it. I never even heard the tape."

He said, "Just sing it with me."

So we did it together...(Jack sings) "Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man, la, da, la..." And I’m thinking, "Whatís going on here?" I didn’t understand for a minute what the big deal this was, then I understood. He didn’t have to say anything to me. He didn’t have to explain. I already knew that it reminded him of that tape. That was their first big hit. A million, it sold a million records. It made a lot of money. That’s the first big tune for the Byrds. It meant a lot to him and signified a lot of good, happy thoughts in his career. He was quite emotional and it was a good trip. I’m sorry we didn’t see the show but we had our own little private concert.

Rolling Thunder was a big tour, 35 days on the road, two buses and 10 automobiles. We had 75 people: Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, myself, Roger McGuinn, T-Bone Burnett, Bobby Neuwirth, Sam Shephard, Allen Ginsberg. All these crazy people traveling together in the U.S. and Canada, day after day, like a circus.