"The Times They Are a-Changin'" is the title track of Bob Dylan's third album, released in January, 1964.
Dylan has said he wrote it "with a purpose" and that he "wanted to write a big song, with short concise verses that piled up on each other in a hypnotic way."
It's among his most covered songs, with versions in a variety of genres: then-contemporary rock acts like Simon & Garfunkel, The Byrds, The Beach Boys and The Hollies; jazz-inspired artists like Nina Simone and Josephine Baker; folk singers like Joan Baez, Odetta, Judy Collins, Richie Havens and Burl Ives; later pop stylists like Bryan Ferry, Billy Joel, Phil Collins, Tracy Chapman and Keb' Mo'; and most recently the Celtic-punk-folk band Flogging Molly.
Oddly, in the 1990s, the song was used in commercials for the accounting firm Coopers and Lybrand and the Bank of Montreal.
In 2010, Dylan's handwritten lyrics to four of the song's verses, jotted on a scrap of paper, were sold at auction for $422,500 to hedge fund manager Adam Sender.