MUSIC

Bruce Springsteen's 'Born to Run' handwritten lyrics headed to Sotheby's auction

Chris Jordan
Asbury Park Press

From a bungalow in Long Branch to your collection?

An early handwritten version of the lyrics for Bruce Springsteen’s “Born to Run,” composed in Long Branch, will be available via a Sotheby’s Books and Manuscripts Online auction from June 18 to 28.

Frank Stefanko's 'Corvette Winter.' It's the images used on the cover of Bruce Springsteen's memoir 'Born to Run.'

The estimated selling price is  $200,000 to $300,000.

“You can’t avoid the fact that the Broadway play put a high level of interest of Springsteen to the forefront,” said Richard Austin, senior vice president and head of books and manuscripts for Sotheby’s to the Asbury Park Press. 

An early hand-written version of the lyrics for Bruce Springsteen's  "Born to Run."

Springsteen performs “Born to Run” nightly in his hit music play “Springsteen on Broadway” at the Walter Kerr Theatre.  

The majority of the lines in this version of the song are unpublished and unrecorded, but it does include “a nearly perfected chorus,” according to Sotheby’s

The house in Long Branch where Bruce Springsteen wrote "Born to Run."

“This town’ll rip the (out your) bones from your back / it’s a suicide trap (rap) (it’s a trap to catch the young) your dead unless / you get out (we got to) while your young so (come on! / with) take my hand cause tramps / like us baby we were born to run,” reads the lyrics.

In all, it's one page, on a single sheet of ruled notepaper, comprising 30 lines written in blue ink with superscript and marginal notations. It's in "fine condition," according to Sotheby's.

The song is now considered one of Springsteen’s, and rock ‘n’ roll’s, greatest ever written.

“After his first two albums ‘Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J.’ and ‘The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle’ received critical acclaim but modest commercial success, the 26-year-old Bruce Springsteen found his career hinging on the success of his next single,” according to Sotheby’s.

“Aiming for musical perfection and (Phil) Spector-level grandeur, Springfield spent six months writing and finalizing ‘Born to Run’, which clocks in at four and a half minutes long. 'Born to Run' was a breakout (runaway? Too much?) smash, and became Springsteen’s first worldwide release.”

The current seller is unidentified. It was sold by former Springsteen manager Mike Appel for $197,000 in 2013.

Springsteen wrote “Born to Run” at 7½ West End Court in the West End section of Long Branch. 

Chris Jordan: cjordan@app.com. Twitter: @chrisfhjordan