Martin Scorsese Reacts to Levon Helm's Death

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• rachel | April 28, 2012 2:46 PMReply

  I agree with you Jev and Jerry. Look closely at his comment, and recall the big rift between Robertson and Helm over the rights of many of The Band's songs. Robertson contends that he has written several, if not all, of The Band's songs. Helm, in This Wheel's On Fire, maintains that many of the songs were co-written with himself, Hudson, Danko, and Manuel. Helm had a very unique perspective about the way bands should function. He never wanted to place any one member at the forefront because he felt strongly in each member’s participation in all facets of the musical process. This also included each member’s access to fame: Helm felt all members should share the “famous spotlight.”
  
  Robertson’s narrative around the song rights issue still asserts (and has been asserting ever since the dawn of this issue) that he did write all of The Band’s songs. Scorsese's comment, "His bandmate Robbie Robertson wrote “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down” for Levon to sing, and I’ll never forget how moving it was to watch him sing it during their final performance at Winterland, which is one of the high points of the movie we made from that show, The Last Waltz," supports Robertson's narrative.
  
  Here's what's really happening in this quote: Scorsese has reiterated, again, what Robertson has also been saying for many years: Robertson wrote all of The Band’s songs. I understand that Robertson has in mind to write a memoir—he claims growing up part Native and having aunts who told him he was full of stories (again to support his narrative about his ability to write songs) prompted him to do so. In an April 11, 2011 Rolling Stone article, writer Matthew Perpetua, says Robertson has signed a contract with Crown Publishers and the Knopf Random Canada Publishing Group.
  
  Essentially what this means: Now that Helm has passed and can no longer voice his dissent regarding this matter (unless Hudson does), Robertson can continue to get away with claiming he wrote all of The Band’s songs. He has got years and years of comments that support this, as does he have Scorsese to support this also. It'll be interesting to see how this plays out.

• Mazdak | April 24, 2013 3:16 AM

  Robbie has never said that he wrote all of songs of The Band. Wish you people do a little research. Check out the credits for the first two albums. there are songs credited to Manuel to Danko and Dank and Bob Dylan (This Wheel's on Fire). There are also songs like Whispering Pines in the later albums that are credited to Manual. So the bone of contention are really two songs, the Band's biggest hits and sellers, and don't forget they were The Beatles. These two songs are The Weight and Dixie. It's all about money and jealousy. The way the Band worked in terms of songwriting is no different than any other band. You think Bill Wyman never contributed in any way to a Stones song? come on, now. The proof is this: songs like The Weight show a unique vision and that vision is evident in Robbie's later works, whereas Manuel's style is totally different. You can't manufacture a song like The Weight. Also, where is all the songs that Levon Helm wrote after Robbie's departure? Robbie went on to write a ton more songs. The other guys had to hire a songwriter to write for them.

• JEV | April 20, 2012 10:50 PMReply

  "Helm called "The Last Waltz" -A DISTASTER! So far nothing I have read for the exception of his own words can explain this further. I perhaps speculate it was all the Robertson "show-boating" going on not only in the Film but within The Band. The constant fighting between taking the credit and not. Levon leaves us that haunting and dramically truthful voice of his own pain and southernly gentleman he was. JEV - Orlando

• jerry | April 20, 2012 2:09 PMReply

  Levon hated Scorsese and the whole experience of making their movie together. Read his account of making the Last Waltz in his blindingly honest book, This Wheel's On Fire.