How Al Kooper Snuck His Way Onto One of Bob Dylan’s Most Iconic Tracks

Amidst the tumultuous changes of the 1960s music industry, sometimes gumption overruled talent, like the time Al Kooper snuck his way onto one of Bob Dylan’s most iconic tracks. Columbia producer Tom Wilson had invited Kooper into the studio while Dylan recorded ‘Highway 61 Revisited’ with clear instructions: Kooper could hang out in the control room only. He wasn’t to enter the live room where the musicians were playing.

As history would show, Kooper ignored Wilson’s directions and hopped on an instrument anyway while the band tracked “Like a Rolling Stone.” The few rebellious moments that followed would come to define Bob Dylan’s quintessential mid-60s sound.

From Green Guitarist to Iconic Organist

When Columbia’s Tom Wilson invited multi-instrumentalist Al Kooper to Bob Dylan’s recording session in the summer of 1965, Wilson was doing his friend a favor. He knew Kooper was a big Dylan fan, albeit a lesser instrumentalist than the ones the “Blowing in the Wind” singer would be working with as they tracked songs from ‘Highway 61 Revisited.’ As such, Wilson set Kooper’s expectations straight. He’d be listening, not playing.

Kooper had other plans. “There was no way in hell I was going to visit a Bob Dylan session and just sit there,” Kooper recalled in an interview with Tony Scherman. “I stayed up all night preceding the session, naively running down all seven of my guitar licks over and over again. Despite my noodling at the piano, I was primarily a guitar player at the time and having gotten a fair amount of session work under my belt, I had developed quite an inflated opinion of my dexterity on said instrument.”

Determined to find his spot on the record, Kooper arrived at the studio an hour early and began warming up, masquerading as a hired hand. As the real players came in and started doing the same, Kooper quickly realized he was in over his head. He retreated into the control room, where Wilson eventually joined him, none the wiser to Kooper’s act. That is, of course, until Dylan suggested that the session keyboardist switch from organ to piano. Suddenly, there was an open seat in the tracking room, and Kooper was going to do just about anything to make that seat his.

How Al Kooper Snuck His Way Onto Bob Dylan’s Track

As soon as the seat at the Hammond organ opened up, Al Kooper begged Tom Wilson to let him into the tracking room. Wilson shot him down, saying he couldn’t even play the instrument. Kooper insisted he could just as another pressing studio issue distracted Wilson and, not having received a formal “no” from the producer, Kooper took that as permission to proceed. Kooper described the nerve-wracking moment to Tony Scherman.

“There is no music to read. The song is over five minutes long, the band is so loud that I can’t even hear the organ, and I’m not familiar with the instrument to begin with. But the tape is rolling, and that is Bob-f***ing-Dylan over there singing, so this had better be me sitting here playing something. The best I could manage was to play hesitantly by sight. After six minutes, they’d gotten the first complete take of the day, and everyone adjourned to the control room to hear it played back.”

Kooper’s hesitation was palpable on the playback, with the organ coming in an eighth note behind everyone else as he felt his way through the song. At one point, Dylan motioned for Wilson to turn up the organ. Kooper said Wilson replied, “Man, that cat’s not an organ player.” Dylan retorted: “Don’t tell me who’s an organ player and who’s not. Just turn the organ up.”

Sure, the organ was a bit simplistic, but artists of the 1960s—especially Dylan—prioritized feeling over finesse. Kooper might not have been an organist, but his gumption and ability to feel what a song needed proved to be all he needed to become one of the most significant instrumentalists of Bob Dylan’s extensive discography.

Photo by Sipa/Shutterstock