As long as there has been popular music, there has been music photography. The two go hand in hand, and the images that the photographers capture are still a vital link between artist and audience. This is especially true in a bygone era where every single move by an artist wasn’t captured on a thousand cellphones and posted on YouTube mere hours after a live concert. In those halcyon days where we had to rely on the work of a skilled photographer to act as the interface between listener and musician, there were a handful of photographers who rose to prominence, and here at Goldmine we have written extensively about many of them. Henry Diltz, Bob Gruen, Neal Preston, Lynn Goldsmith and Annie Leibovitz are some of the names that come immediately to mind. One thing that the aforementioned photographers have in common is that their portfolios don’t tend to concentrate on a singular artist. There is a small list of photographers who were there at the beginning of an artist’s career, documenting their rise to stardom in a very intimate and revealing manner.
Dezo Hoffmann did it with The Beatles; his photos of The Fab Four show a band at the cusp of international fame, giving us a glimpse into some of the most intimate facets of their rise to stardom. Here in the U.S., there is another photographer whose work is very closely associated with one of the biggest artists in the history of American music, and that man is Frank Stefanko. The artist of course is Bruce Springsteen. Yes, Stefanko has shot other artists such as Patti Smith with an equal amount of excellence (it was actually his relationship with Smith that brought him to Springsteen), but there is probably no photographer more closely associated with a single artist than Stefanko is with Springsteen.
What Stefanko has given us is more than just a bunch of random photos of Bruce and The E Street Band, or a collection of live shots. He has given us a look deep inside the lives of the band, drawing us in and making us feel that we know these people, a real sense of, “I know exactly what Bruce was thinking there.” If you grew up around the East Coast in a certain time, it’s quite easy to put yourself into “Corvette Winter,” leaning against a car in a nondescript neighborhood, right at the time where the snow has melted just enough for you to get a jump on spring, after having stored your automotive love away for the winter. You’ve waited months for this day, and you aren’t going to be denied, filled with youthful exuberance and a lust for the months ahead, feeling that something great is just over the horizon, just past the state line, much like Springsteen conveys in his songs.
Stefanko is responsible for the covers of two of Springsteen’s seminal albums, and , and has shot countless numbers of intimate portraits of Springsteen, and in turn has made us all feel that we Bruce in a way that we know no other artist. Stefanko made Springsteen relatable to us all, and for an artist who has always strived to relate to his fans like no other artist, the collaboration between the two was an intrinsic part of the Springsteen ethos. To look at one of Stefanko’s images of Springsteen is to get a glimpse of an artist about to break out creatively. Fame has not consumed artists.
