Rock Island Line
Lead Belly didn't write this Arkansas railroad work song, but his 1937 Library of Congress recording entirely transformed it. Sitting before John Lomax's disc recorder in Washington, D.C., Lead Belly added a fast-talking, comedic spoken-word intro about a train engineer smuggling pig iron through a tollgate by claiming it's livestock. When his booming twelve-string guitar finally kicks in, it flawlessly mimics a chugging freight train. This specific recording crossed the Atlantic and ignited the 1950s British "skiffle" craze; Lonnie Donegan's frantic 1955 cover directly inspired a young John Lennon to start his own band, the Quarrymen.
The floating-verse lineage for this recording (who else recorded it, where the melody or lyric traveled, and how it was adapted) is still being mapped. This section will trace the song's DNA across the archive.
Contributions welcome at OlMrRead@ccblues.com.