Business
Rock Stars Are Making Fortunes Cashing In on Their Old Songs
Bob Dylan, Stevie Nicks, and other big-time musicians are selling their catalogs to aggressive new buyers.
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Bob Dylan was supposed to spend the summer of 2020 on tour, winding his way from the Les Schwab Amphitheater in Bend, Ore., to the Bethel Woods Center for the Arts in upstate New York. Instead, stranded at home because of the pandemic, he lined up the biggest payday of his career.
For years, music executives had approached Dylan about buying his catalog, which includes more than 600 songs such as Blowin’ in the Wind and Like a Rolling Stone. Dylan always turned them down, but in December the 79-year-old reconsidered and made more than $300 million in a pact with Universal Music Group Inc.