Train songs

[wgnrr]

Canadian Railroad Trilogy, Steel Rail Blues, The Watchman's Gone, all written by Gordon Lightfoot.

CANADIANPACIFIC2816

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"There was a time in this fair land when the railroad did not run, when the wild majestic mountains stood alone against the sun, long before the white man, and long before the wheel, when the green, dark forest was too silent to be real." Gordon Lightfoot

Ditto to that!

Canadian Railroad Trilogy is not only my favorite railroad song, is is my favorite song, period.

Phil

[The Old Man]

The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down by The Band.  Sounds like a group of civil war era musicians who somehow got their hands on electric instruments.

Also note the sound of the horns in their song The Unfaithful Servant.  They come in right after the line, "I can hear the whistle blowing."  It will transport you to another time.

[SSW9389]

Born in Kingsland, Arkansas in a shotgun house backed up to the Cotton Belt main was Johnny Cash. His uncle was a Cotton Belt engineer. So naturally my favorite is Ridin' on the Cotton Belt from The Last Gunfighter Ballad album from 1977. It's a song about his daddy hopping a train to get home.  

[alphas]

I'm glad to see someone else remembered Stonewall Jackson's SMOKE ALONG THE TRACKS.  This was one of the all-time best country train songs.  I seem to recall it was the "B" side on his big crossover hit "WATERLOO"--but I can't swear to it. 

[Cris_261]

Here's a couple of songs that don't have anything to do with trains other than one song has the word "train" in the title, and the other has a railroad related line in the lyrics.

The Farm - Groovy Train

 

Sisters of Mercy - Lucretia My Reflection (contains the line "once a railroad, now it's done")

[Falcon48]

What's your favorite train-related song?



My favorites include Folsom Prison Blues by Johnny Cash, On the Atchison, Topeka and the Santa Fe as sung by Bing Crosby, and Chattanooga Choo-Choo as recorded by Glenn Miller.

(1) Mother's Lying in a Box in the Baggage Coach Ahead (an awful piece, but it's got a great title)

(2) Hey Engineer! (novelty tune spoofing all the songs about taking trains back to the South)

(3) This Train Don't Carry No Gamblers (Turk Murphy novelty version)

(4) Two-Nineteen Blues (only recording I know was by Jelly Roll Morton in a Library of Congress interview in 1941) 

(5) The Rock Island Line (1950's novelty version)

(6) Charlie and the MTA (which is actually set to a much older railroad tune - it may be Wreck of the Old 97 but, off the top of my head, I'm not sure)

(7) The Trolley Song (from Meet Me In St. Louis)

(8) Shuffle Off to Buffalo (from 42nd Street)

 

For number 6, are you referring to the Smother's Brothers song of the late 60s, early 70s? 

The Smothers Brothers may well have done #6 (they did lots of funny stuff) but it wasn't by them.  It was originally done as a campaign song for a mayoral candidate in Boston about 1949 or so.  That's the reason for the last chorus about fighting the fare increase by electing "George O'Brien" (he lost).  It was then made famous by a group in the 1950's but offhand, I don't remember who they were.

By the way, another interesting but obscure train piece is the "Great Crush Collision March".  It's a piano piece (no words) written to commemorate a staged train wreck on the MKT in Texas in 1896 which didn't come out as planned (the boilers exploded and sent shrapnel into the crowd).  The promoter was the aptly named William Crush, the railroad's General Passenger Agent, hence the title. The piece is noteworthy because it was written by ragtime composer Scott Joplin, and was one of his first published pieces (it may have been his first), predating his ragtime pieces.

[Ishmael]

What's your favorite train-related song?



My favorites include Folsom Prison Blues by Johnny Cash, On the Atchison, Topeka and the Santa Fe as sung by Bing Crosby, and Chattanooga Choo-Choo as recorded by Glenn Miller.

(1) Mother's Lying in a Box in the Baggage Coach Ahead (an awful piece, but it's got a great title)

(2) Hey Engineer! (novelty tune spoofing all the songs about taking trains back to the South)

(3) This Train Don't Carry No Gamblers (Turk Murphy novelty version)

(4) Two-Nineteen Blues (only recording I know was by Jelly Roll Morton in a Library of Congress interview in 1941) 

(5) The Rock Island Line (1950's novelty version)

(6) Charlie and the MTA (which is actually set to a much older railroad tune - it may be Wreck of the Old 97 but, off the top of my head, I'm not sure)

(7) The Trolley Song (from Meet Me In St. Louis)

(8) Shuffle Off to Buffalo (from 42nd Street)

 

For number 6, are you referring to the Smother's Brothers song of the late 60s, early 70s? 

The Smothers Brothers may well have done #6 (they did lots of funny stuff) but it wasn't by them.  It was originally done as a campaign song for a mayoral candidate in Boston about 1949 or so.  That's the reason for the last chorus about fighting the fare increase by electing "George O'Brien" (he lost).  It was then made famous by a group in the 1950's but offhand, I don't remember who they were.

By the way, another interesting but obscure train piece is the "Great Crush Collision March".  It's a piano piece (no words) written to commemorate a staged train wreck on the MKT in Texas in 1896 which didn't come out as planned (the boilers exploded and sent shrapnel into the crowd).  The promoter was the aptly named William Crush, the railroad's General Passenger Agent, hence the title. The piece is noteworthy because it was written by ragtime composer Scott Joplin, and was one of his first published pieces (it may have been his first), predating his ragtime pieces.

The 1950's group was the Kingston Trio, a folk group. The tune was from "The Ship that Never Returned", but parts of the melody are also in "The Wreck of Old 97". Good melodies can always be adapted.

Choo Choo Ch'boogie was recorded in the 40's by Louis Jordan, but I don't know if he was the originator. It was my Uncle Elmer's favorite song. He worked for the Wabash. He's also the man who made a railfan out of me, may he rest in peace.

 

 

[csxengineer98]

Doug Macleod... THE NEW PANAMA LIMITED

http://www.doug-macleod.com/music.html 

got to the very bottom of the list..you can listen to a 30 second clip of it...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_EiRGJTMZyI

to watch him preform it... 

csx engineer