Bob Dylan's Times They Are A-Changin' lyrics for sale for US$2.2m

Los Angeles

BOB Dylan's handwritten lyrics to his 1960s classic The Times They Are A-Changin' are going up for sale with a US$2.2 million asking price in what could mark a world record for rock lyrics.

Gary Zimet, owner of Los Angeles-based autograph dealers Moments in Time, said on Sunday that the one-page sheet of lyrics, written in a notebook and with changes and scribbles, was originally owned by Dylan's current manager, Jeff Rosen, and was now being sold by an anonymous private collector.

"It's not an auction. It's a private sale. First come, first served," Zimet said.

Dylan's handwritten lyrics to Like a Rolling Stone fetched a world-record US$2 million when they were sold at auction by Sotheby's in New York in 2014.

The Times They Are A-Changin', written by Dylan back in 1963 and released on his 1964 album of the same name, is regarded as one of the most iconic protest songs of the 1960s.

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Zimet said he was also selling the lyrics of two other Dylan songs - his 1965 track Subterranean Homesick Blues for US$1.2 million and 1969 ballad Lay Lady Lay for US$650,000.

"They are not quite as important, as iconic," said Zimet, explaining the lower prices. Subterranean Homesick Blues' is certainly a major, major song but not in the same league as The Times They Are A-Changin'.

The lyrics to popular songs, especially when handwritten and with scratched-out ideas or doodles, have become some of the most sought-after items for collectors of celebrity memorabilia. Don McLean's 16-page draft for American Pie fetched US$1.2 million in 2015, while Paul McCartney's scribbled partial lyrics for a recording of Hey Jude sold for US$910,000 at an online auction earlier this month.

Dylan, 78, last month released his first original music in eight years with a 17-minute song called Murder Most Foul that was inspired by the 1963 assassination of then-US president John F Kennedy. In 2016, Dylan became the only singer-songwriter to win the Nobel Prize for Literature. REUTERS