For $300 million not bad for an old guy
The interesting part of that sale is the extent to which his songs are directly or indirectly based on folksongs which do not themselves fall under copyright, which means that a lot of Dylan’s musical output may well be public domain to some degree.
The words are Bob’s - and I think most people consider the words to be the most important bit of Dylan songs - but for music scholars the legal status of the tunes remains fascinating.
I know one song partly based on folk is Girl from north country or North Country girl.
Certainly many sings from his folk singer days would be based on melodies from older songs. Fitting new words to old tunes was very common practice is folk circles. “Blowin’ in the Wind” famously draws its tune from “No More Auction Block”, a Civil War era spiritual.
Note that there’s a link in my previous post to a list of Dylan songs based on older folktunes. It’s a surprisingly long list.