How many songs has Bob Dylan written?
Bob Dylan is not only one of the most revered and respected artists of all time, but he is undeniably one of the most prolific. Since his breakout in the early 1960s, the folk star has released 40 studio albums, 21 live albums, 17 volumes of his bootleg series which each have mammoth tracklists, and plenty more compilations. His released discography is lengthy, but that barely even scratches the surface of his full archive of songs.
From the start, Dylan made a myth of himself. When he first emerged on the folk scene after travelling to New York to seek out his idol, Woody Guthrie, he built a whole fiction of himself. He told the world that he’d run away as a kid and toured with the circus or countless other crazy stories about a beatnik life. But in reality, Dylan was simply a normal kid from a small town but with a clear gift. However, his self-mythologising worked as soon his songs, along with his stories, made him a star as the music world seemed to instantly fall into an unfaltering belief that this new singer was the new leader of the pack.
His debut single, ‘Mixed-Up Confusion’, was released in 1962 but was in no way the first song Dylan had ever written. “I always kind of wrote my own songs, but I never really would play them,” he once said, seeing songwriting as a constant part of his life, starting as a young kid and seeing him through to today. In his eyes, the first real song he wrote was ‘A Song for Woodie Guthrie’, written as a homage to his idol and eventually appearing on his debut record.
But the thing with Dylan is that, really, his discography is a bit of a mess. The 40 studio albums are simple, but any dedicated Dylan fan knows that the bootleg series is where the important stuff lies, chronicling demos, studio outtakes and unreleased tracks from throughout his career. The 17 editions span decades of his career, attempting to fill in the gaps left by his official studio releases and attempting to bring more of his extensive archive out into the world.
Yet still, there are countless Dylan songs that the average listener won’t even know exists. Unless you’re a completely dedicated and obsessed follower, he’s a difficult musician to keep up with, as it would be almost impossible for any fan to know every single Dylan song.
Dylan himself likely does. Even during his decades of live shows, he still has barely made a dent in his discography as so many of his songs are in the depths of his archive as there are simply too many for one man to get through.
So, how many songs does Bob Dylan have?
Between his first single in 1962 and his most recent release in 2024, Bob Dylan is estimated to have written more than 600 songs.
When Universal Music purchased his entire songwriting catalog in 2022, it was the biggest acquisition ever of a single act’s publishing rights as suddenly the business took control of his extensive discography. It cost them a pretty penny too as it’s reported that the deal was set at more than $300 million.
But even the estimation of over 600 is a guess. In his book Chronicles Vol. 1, Dylan himself guessed that the actual number was probably more like 1000, but who really knows? If all of his unreleased, half-written, co-written or reworked songs are counted, 1000 is probably more accurate.
On his own website, they’re counting 706 songs but this list includes any song released on one of Dylan’s albums as well as any song played live so is a bit of a jumbled number.
So realistically, the answer to how many songs Bob Dylan has written is, annoyingly, no one knows. For a man who spent his youth lying about his origin, who knows how much to trust his claims, and for a musician with such a wealth of unreleased, abandoned or demo tracks that never saw the light of day, there is no doubt countless songs that have been lost along the way so never made it into any official statistic. But somewhere between the regions of 600 and 1000 seems like a good guess.
Never Miss A Tale
The Far Out Bob Dylan Newsletter
All the latest stories about Bob Dylan from the independent voice of culture.
Straight to your inbox.