Bob Dylan Plays First Live Performance of “Hurricane,” His Song Defending Rubin “Hurricane” Carter (RIP) in 1975

This week­end, Rubin “Hur­ri­cane” Carter passed away. He was 76. An Amer­i­can mid­dleweight box­er, Carter was tried and con­vict­ed twice (once 1967, again in 1976) for homi­cides that took place in Pater­son, New Jer­sey in 1966 — despite the fact that there were no fin­ger prints or eye­wit­ness­es con­nect­ing him to the crime. (Both con­vic­tions were lat­er over­turned when courts found that the tri­als were taint­ed by pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al mis­con­duct.) Before the sec­ond tri­al, Bob Dylan met with Carter in prison and then wrote “Hur­ri­cane,” a protest song that reached #33 on the Bill­board chart. Accord­ing to Jam­base, Dylan brought a trio to Chicago’s WTTW Stu­dios for a three-song per­for­mance where they played “Hur­ri­cane” on Sep­tem­ber 10, 1975. He’s backed by Scar­let Rivera on vio­lin, Rob Ston­er on bass, and Howie Wyeth on drums. It was appar­ent­ly Dylan’s first live per­for­mance of the eight minute song.

PS Sor­ry for the ad that plays before the video. We have no con­trol over that.

via Expect­ing Rain

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Bob Dylan Reads From T.S. Eliot’s Great Mod­ernist Poem The Waste Land

Bob Dylan and George Har­ri­son Play Ten­nis, 1969

Bob Dylan and Van Mor­ri­son Sing Togeth­er in Athens, on His­toric Hill Over­look­ing the Acrop­o­lis