Ben Preiss
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The Pulitzers, considered America’s highest national honor, were only awarded to classical music until 1996 when the award was given to jazz artist Wynton Marsalis. Dylan, the first rocker to break through, received a special honorary musical award for his “profound impact on popular music and American culture, marked by lyrical compositions of extraordinary poetic power.” Previous recipients of the special Pulitzer include jazz icon John Coltrane, composer George Gershwin and science-fiction author Ray Bradbury.  It was the first time Pulitzer judges, who have long favored classical music, and, more recently, jazz, awarded an art form once dismissed as barbaric, even subversive.
"I am in disbelief," Dylan fan and fellow Pulitzer winner Junot Diaz said of Dylan's award.
Dylan's victory doesn't mean that the Pulitzers have forgotten classical composers. The competitive prize for music was given to David Lang's "The Little Match Girl Passion," which opened last fall at Carnegie Hall, where Dylan has also performed.
"Bob Dylan is the most frequently played artist in my household so the idea that I am honored at the same time as Bob Dylan, that is humbling," Lang told the AP.
Long after most of his contemporaries either died, left the business or held on by the ties of nostalgia, Dylan continues to tour almost continuously and release highly regarded CDs, most recently "Modern Times." Fans, critics and academics have obsessed over his lyrics — even digging through his garbage for clues — since the mid-1960s, when such protest anthems as "Blowin' in the Wind" made Dylan a poet and prophet for a rebellious generation.
(news.yahoo)References: latimes, news.yahoo Filed In: |
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