Live performances/talks/gigs
CANTERBURY ARTS FESTIVAL 2012:
"The best-attended event of the fortnight."
DIRECTOR, YORK FESTIVAL OF IDEAS 2013:
"Your talk was fantastic, and a real boost to the programme."
JOE BUTLER'S BLOG:
"Michael has always struck me as a master of the bon mot, and of course much more, and he didn't disappoint last night. He was urbane, witty and erudite by turns and displayed a complete grasp of the Dylan oeuvre and a wide ranging knowledge of the blues."
EVERY SMITH BLOG:
"Michael spoke for two hours [with an interval] on Bob Dylan and the Poetry of the Blues. (He did this without a note...) Michael’s faultless performance is clearly the result of professional preparation and erudition, as well as a continuing passion for his subject... So an interesting evening, an informative evening, an enjoyable evening. But what I loved most were those moments when Michael was suddenly revealed as a fan rather than an academic commentator: when a smile would break out as he noted in one context that “only Bob could write that”; or, when I watched his relish and animation as the audio played the outtake of Blind Willie McTell from the Infidels sessions."
STANFORD UNIVERSITY ENGLISH DEPARTMENT:
"Your lecture was superb."
THE SIXTIES: A JOURNAL OF HISTORY, POLITICS AND CULTURE:
"Happily the keynote address from author Michael Gray provided a warm, entertaining, and highly amusing lecture (largely without notes)."
ULSTER TV:
"Good-humoured and insightful, Gray is an engaging speaker Everything in his well constructed and well-delivered performance was done from memory and Gray is a masterful communicator."
DIRECTOR, SHETLAND ARTS:
"Michael Gray not only attracted a substantial audience for each of his two talks, he held them rapt. People were raving about Bob Dylan and the Poetry of the Blues for weeks afterwards."
UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA:
"He is a very engaging speaker, an entertainer at heart for all his impressive credentials. It’s a pity he doesn’t have a weekly TV show. He has a wonderful facility for fishing up the right words. His talk sounded both well-rehearsed and freshly improvised."
COLCHESTER:
"Dylan fans poured out of the woodwork, young and old, for what proved to be not only a brilliantly researched talk but a highly entertaining evening with rare video footage and little known songs interjected. A perfect show - clever, funny and fresh."
STEVE HARLEY:
" It was great - really great!"
CORK, IRELAND:
"Michael Gray is a witty, effusive, self-deprecating speaker. A wonderful eye-opener of an evening."
WEST VALLEY COLLEGE, SARATOGA, CALIFORNIA:
"Thanks so much for your talk - it was everything I hoped for - and more. The 'more' being, among other things, the wonderful, evocative excerpts you read from Hand Me My Travelin' Shoes."
SUNDAY TRIBUNE [Ireland]:
"Michael Gray, the world's foremost Bob Dylanologist, is telling people how it really is. Entertaining with wit and insight, Gray is clearly enjoying himself."
DARLINGTON:
"A tremendously enjoyable evening."
DIRECTOR, McDUFFIE MUSEUM, GEORGIA:
"We'd love to have you back to speak again. Everyone that came to the reading was riveted. I still hear great things."
HIGHLAND NEWS [Scotland]:
"This was a wonderful evening packed with information, insight and humour. More please!"
SHIELDS GAZETTE:
"Fans were held spellbound. The management should be applauded for staging this gig with a difference."
CONNECTICUT COLLEGE, NEW LONDON CT:
"Michael Gray's encyclopedic grasp of Dylan was on full display. We had a large audience made up of people from the New London community as well as students and faculty. Our students were wowed by Michael's laid-back delivery--a perfectly timed talk with no notes--and by the range and [n.b.!] depth of his knowledge of Dylan and the blues. He not only left them with plenty to think about for the rest of the semester but put to rest any idea that Dylan scholarship gets in the way of appreciating Dylan."
EASTERN DAILY PRESS, NORWICH:
"Fascinating, fluent and funny."
PROGRAMME DIRECTOR, SEDBERGH BOOK FESTIVAL, 2009:
"Michael Gray's event was the highlight of the festival."
CANTERBURY ARTS FESTIVAL 2012:
"The best-attended event of the fortnight."
DIRECTOR, YORK FESTIVAL OF IDEAS 2013:
"Your talk was fantastic, and a real boost to the programme."
JOE BUTLER'S BLOG:
"Michael has always struck me as a master of the bon mot, and of course much more, and he didn't disappoint last night. He was urbane, witty and erudite by turns and displayed a complete grasp of the Dylan oeuvre and a wide ranging knowledge of the blues."
EVERY SMITH BLOG:
"Michael spoke for two hours [with an interval] on Bob Dylan and the Poetry of the Blues. (He did this without a note...) Michael’s faultless performance is clearly the result of professional preparation and erudition, as well as a continuing passion for his subject... So an interesting evening, an informative evening, an enjoyable evening. But what I loved most were those moments when Michael was suddenly revealed as a fan rather than an academic commentator: when a smile would break out as he noted in one context that “only Bob could write that”; or, when I watched his relish and animation as the audio played the outtake of Blind Willie McTell from the Infidels sessions."
STANFORD UNIVERSITY ENGLISH DEPARTMENT:
"Your lecture was superb."
THE SIXTIES: A JOURNAL OF HISTORY, POLITICS AND CULTURE:
"Happily the keynote address from author Michael Gray provided a warm, entertaining, and highly amusing lecture (largely without notes)."
ULSTER TV:
"Good-humoured and insightful, Gray is an engaging speaker Everything in his well constructed and well-delivered performance was done from memory and Gray is a masterful communicator."
DIRECTOR, SHETLAND ARTS:
"Michael Gray not only attracted a substantial audience for each of his two talks, he held them rapt. People were raving about Bob Dylan and the Poetry of the Blues for weeks afterwards."
UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA:
"He is a very engaging speaker, an entertainer at heart for all his impressive credentials. It’s a pity he doesn’t have a weekly TV show. He has a wonderful facility for fishing up the right words. His talk sounded both well-rehearsed and freshly improvised."
COLCHESTER:
"Dylan fans poured out of the woodwork, young and old, for what proved to be not only a brilliantly researched talk but a highly entertaining evening with rare video footage and little known songs interjected. A perfect show - clever, funny and fresh."
STEVE HARLEY:
" It was great - really great!"
CORK, IRELAND:
"Michael Gray is a witty, effusive, self-deprecating speaker. A wonderful eye-opener of an evening."
WEST VALLEY COLLEGE, SARATOGA, CALIFORNIA:
"Thanks so much for your talk - it was everything I hoped for - and more. The 'more' being, among other things, the wonderful, evocative excerpts you read from Hand Me My Travelin' Shoes."
SUNDAY TRIBUNE [Ireland]:
"Michael Gray, the world's foremost Bob Dylanologist, is telling people how it really is. Entertaining with wit and insight, Gray is clearly enjoying himself."
DARLINGTON:
"A tremendously enjoyable evening."
DIRECTOR, McDUFFIE MUSEUM, GEORGIA:
"We'd love to have you back to speak again. Everyone that came to the reading was riveted. I still hear great things."
HIGHLAND NEWS [Scotland]:
"This was a wonderful evening packed with information, insight and humour. More please!"
SHIELDS GAZETTE:
"Fans were held spellbound. The management should be applauded for staging this gig with a difference."
CONNECTICUT COLLEGE, NEW LONDON CT:
"Michael Gray's encyclopedic grasp of Dylan was on full display. We had a large audience made up of people from the New London community as well as students and faculty. Our students were wowed by Michael's laid-back delivery--a perfectly timed talk with no notes--and by the range and [n.b.!] depth of his knowledge of Dylan and the blues. He not only left them with plenty to think about for the rest of the semester but put to rest any idea that Dylan scholarship gets in the way of appreciating Dylan."
EASTERN DAILY PRESS, NORWICH:
"Fascinating, fluent and funny."
PROGRAMME DIRECTOR, SEDBERGH BOOK FESTIVAL, 2009:
"Michael Gray's event was the highlight of the festival."