Times They Are A-Changin': It's Dylan at West Point
It could have been just another Bob Dylan concert, complete with sneering, pointed lyrics, jamming electric guitars and a few reflective ballads. But this time the hall was packed with future Army commanders.
Mr. Dylan, who galvanized the 1960's anti-war movement, played to a standing ovation Saturday night at the Dwight D. Eisenhower Hall theater at the United States Military Academy. Among the crowd of 4,020 were hundreds of vocal West Point cadets who were clearly in bliss from the music.
'Best Time I've Ever Had'
The clean-cut future officers, in their dress-gray uniforms, with military medals and patent leather shoes, danced in the aisles, shimmied their shoulders and pumped their arms in the air. Some accompanied the songs with riffs on imaginary guitars, still others pogoed up and down, and a few just smiled as they mingled with civilian ''groupies'' in tie-dyed T-shirts.
When Mr. Dylan played his most famous song, ''Blowin' in the Wind,'' at the end of the concert, many of the cadets stood, closed their eyes and quietly sang along.
''I've been here for four years, and this is the best time I've ever had,'' said Steven J. Cavioli Jr., a cadet. ''To get cadets to unleash is really something and Bob Dylan did it tonight. We're not politically agreeing with Bob Dylan. We're just shifting all that stuff aside and enjoying his music.''
This was Mr. Dylan's first appearance at West Point, and its announcement several weeks ago was met with a mixed, if muffled, reception.
No protest of the event occurred publicly, but many at the academy said friends and faculty had griped about the decision to invite ''that hippie'' to perform on the eve of General Eisenhower's 100th birthday.
Others were upset that the concert had been scheduled during the one fall weekend when cadets were allowed to leave the campus. On Saturday the academy was almost abandoned as a majority of the 4,400 cadets were visiting their homes.
The academy's cultural arts director, William Yost, said that he had hoped to schedule the event for homecoming weekend but that Mr. Dylan had not been available then. Only through chance was Mr. Yost able to find an available weekend: the Radio City Rockettes postponed their performance at West Point for Saturday, a date that Mr. Dylan was free.
From Opera to George Burns
Mr. Yost said he had been trying to bring Mr. Dylan to West Point for several years and was ecstatic about the show. ''We try to expose the cadets to a broad range of events, everything from opera to George Burns,'' he said. ''Dylan is a figure who has had an important impact over the last decade. There's no reason we wouldn't present him.''
Mr. Dylan's representative said the singer did not see Saturday's concert as anything out of the ordinary. ''Bob Dylan is doing pretty much the same thing that he has been doing for the last 30 years,'' Mr. Dylan's press agent, Elliott Mintz, said. ''The nature of the venue is not of great importance to Bob. He's just Bob.''
But many hard-core Dylan fans shook their heads in disbelief as they entered the auditorium, walking under banners for the Screaming Eagles (101st Airborne Division) and Hell on Wheels (Second Armored Division). They said the concert, in a setting they variously described as ''weird,'' ''bizarre'' and the ''belly of the beast,'' had a special intensity.
Lucian K. Truscott 4th, a graduate of West Point who wrote ''Dress Gray,'' a scathing portrait of life at the academy, said the event was ''extraordinary'' for the academy.
''About the most radical show that came there in my time was the Beach Boys,'' he said.
An 'Amazing' Idea
''What the place exists for - what it's done since 1802 - is to allow older officers to pass on the knowledge of how to exercise power,'' Mr. Truscott said. ''They socialize you so that when you're 45 or 50, you can be the national security adviser in the White House. The idea that they'd introduce Bob Dylan into that is amazing.''
Early in the show, people were up on their feet as Mr. Dylan performed ''Masters of War,'' a sharp criticism of political and military leaders. Cadets who were ushers for the show moved through the crowd, politely tapping people on the shoulder and asking them to sit down.
''It's like we're back in junior high,'' murmured one cadet who had been ordered to take his seat.
''We need to stay in formation,'' another said somewhat sarcastically.
After the song received only polite applause, Mr. Dylan moved quickly into his next number.
