The latest issue of The New Yorker magazine features an in-depth look at the life and career of Willie Nelson. The article includes comments about the 92-year-old country-music icon from his musical friends, associates, and fans, including Bob Dylan.
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The folk-rock legend was asked to share his reflections on Nelson, and he offered a lengthy, poetic appraisal of Willie and his impactful contributions to music and the world.
“It’s hard to talk about Willie without saying something stupid or irrelevant, he is so much of everything,” Bob began. “How can you make sense of him? How would you define the indefinable or the unfathomable? What is there to say? Ancient Viking Soul? Master Builder of the Impossible? Patron poet of people who never quite fit in and don’t much care to? Moonshine Philosopher? Tumbleweed singer with a PhD? Red Bandana troubadour, braids like twin ropes lassoing eternity?”
Dylan continued, “What do you say about a guy who plays an old, battered guitar that he treats like it’s the last loyal dog in the universe? Cowboy apparition, writes songs with holes that you can crawl through to escape from something. Voice like a warm porchlight left on for wanderers who kissed goodbye too soon or stayed too long.”
He concluded, “I guess you can say all that. But it really doesn’t tell you a lot or explain anything about Willie. Personally speaking I’ve always known him to be kind, generous, tolerant and understanding of human feebleness, a benefactor, a father and a friend. He’s like the invisible air. He’s high and low. He’s in harmony with nature. And that’s what makes him Willie.”
About Dylan’s Connection with Nelson
Dylan has taken part in the last two editions of Nelson’s Outlaw Music Festival tour, in 2024 and 2025.
In 1983, during the sessions for his studio album Infidels, Dylan recorded a cover of the classic 1980 Nelson song “Angel Flying Too Close to the Ground.” Bob’s cover initially appeared on the B-side of his European single “I and I.” It also is featured on Dylan’s 2021 archival box set The Bootleg Series Vol. 16: Springtime in New York 1980–1985.
Meanwhile, Bob and Willie both contributed vocals to the 1985 charity single “We Are the World.” Later that year, Dylan’s comments at the Live Aid festival in Philadelphia led to the launch of Farm Aid, the charity and annual benefit concert co-founded by Nelson, Neil Young, and John Mellencamp that supports independent and family farms in the U.S.
Dylan and Wilson also co-wrote a song called “Heartland” that they recorded as a duet for Willie’s 1993 album Across the Borderline.
Recent Dylan and Nelson News
Dylan has lined up a 2026 spring U.S. leg of his ongoing Rough and Rowdy World Tour. The 27-date out kicks off March 21 in Omaha, Nebraska, and runs through a May 1 show in Abilene, Texas.
Bob’s latest release is The Bootleg Series Vol. 18: Through the Open Window, 1956–1963, an archival collection of some his earliest recordings. It arrived in October 2025.
Nelson’s most recent album is Workin’ Man: Willie Sings Merle, a collection of songs by the late Merle Haggard. The record, which was released in November, is Nelson’s 78th solo studio album and 155th album overall.
(Photo by M. Caulfield/WireImage for NBC Universal Photo Department)
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