From the beginning of the article:
In this concluding essay, I will present a contemporary performative practice, i.e. not primarily the songs, which are the central items of the event as individual artefacts, but the performative act constituted by practice – also in the light of statements formulated by some participants – with the aim to show how this practice may be read as part of the foreground of medieval representational church rituals.
At the address http://groups.yahoo.com/group/smalltalkatthewall, one finds, among other services, a message board, pictures from various Dylan events, as well as other information. The webpage belongs to a particular group of Bob Dylan fans, the smalltalkatthewall. More unusual, at least to my knowledge, is the fact that this group organizes what is called a Dylan hoot. The expression stems from the term ‘hootenanny’, which was coined by Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger in the mid-twentieth century. This hoot night, which normally takes place on Tuesdays at 8 p.m. Eastern time (US), is a chat room event where members not only chat, but where some members at the same time perform live, mainly Bob Dylan songs but frequently also songs by other song-writers.
One might characterize the event as a mixture of a chat room and a public concert. Or, one might use the musical salons prominent around 1800 in the higher European societies as a kind of analogy. The performative event may in any case be described as a mixture of a private and a public concert practice.You must be a member in order to participate in the hoot event. On the other hand, anyone with internet access can become a member. These events go on for many hours and have a certain traditionality in terms of the kind of chat exchanges that are made and the way these evenings or nights proceed altogether.