Good Morning America, How Are You?

The following is reported on today's Trains Newswire. Personally, I think it's great....!

" Arlo Guthrie riding the City of New Orleans to benefit Gulf Coast musician hurricane victims.

"CHICAGO — 'Good morning America, how are you? / Say, don't you know me, I'm your native son? / I'm the train they call The City of New Orleans. / I'll be gone 500 miles when the day is done.'

"More than 30 years ago, folk musician Arlo Guthrie had one of his biggest hits with the song, 'City of New Orleans,' written by the late Steve Goodman, a Chicago native and folk singer, a story in Friday’s Chicago Tribune reminds us.

“ 'City of New Orleans,' an out-of-place-sounding record during the heyday of glitter rock circa 1970, was a paean to the then-dying American passenger train, jarring in both its poignancy and sheer catchiness. The lyrics made it obvious that Goodman had ridden the real train of that name, a streamliner on the Illinois Central Railroad that left the Windy City and Crescent City in the morning and arrived at the other terminal late in the evening. The song’s emorable chorus, with its 'Good morning America, how are you?' is embedded in the collective consciousness of American culture.

"Amtrak kept the Chicago-New Orleans route and the train name for six months, but reverted to the name 'Panama Limited,' another old IC train, when the train was on an overnight schedule. Amtrak brought back the 'City of New Orleans,' name, this time for good, in 1981.

"Now Guthrie is riding Amtrak’s a daily full-service Superliner train, from Chicago to New Orleans on a two-week concert tour that will raise money for Gulf Coast musicians who lost their livelihood as a result of Hurricane Katrina.

"Tonight, Guthrie and a band that includes his son Abe, daughter Sarah Lee Guthrie, and her partner, Johnny Irion, will perform in Chicago in their first of seven concerts on the train’s 926-mile route. It is one of four concerts to be held in Illinois; the next is scheduled for Wednesday in Kankakee, a town mentioned in the song.

"The tour marks the first time Guthrie will ride The City of New Orleans. 'I'm incredibly excited,' the 58-year-old Guthrie told the Tribune by phone last week from his home in Massachusetts. 'I have a feeling it's going to be an amazing experience.'

"Guthrie had his own painful lesson with hurricanes: his Florida home was nearly destroyed last year during hurricane season, so he has hard-earned empathy for the residents of New Orleans. That, coupled with a recent governmental debate regarding federal funding for Amtrak, got him thinking about ways he could help.

" 'Like everyone else, we sent money to the Red Cross,' he said. While watching the news about the situation in New Orleans, he noticed a little scroll across the bottom of the TV screen, saying 'Amtrak is resuming service to the region with the City of New Orleans', and an idea popped into his mind.

" 'I started thinking, Is there anything else I should be doing? And I realized that there was perhaps something that only I could do.'

"Amtrak was happy to provide the use of the train to Guthrie, son of legendary folk icon Woody Guthrie, and his entourage.

" 'It's a very positive thing,' said Amtrak spokesman Marc Magliari, who expects to ride the train for at least part of the trip. 'We've got 350 employees in New Orleans.'

"The Tribune said Guthrie has been busily recruiting guest artists to appear, as well. Cyril Neville of the Neville Brothers will perform at the Chicago show, which is being underwritten by comedian and Illinois native Richard Pryor. Willie Nelson, who had his own hit with Goodman's song in the early '80s, will appear at the final show.

"Guthrie has no set amount he hopes to raise — 'just as much as I can' — but says he's confident it will make a difference in helping restore the musical infrastructure of New Orleans, a very important aspect in the long-term resuscitation of the city."

 

I belive I mentioned this before,that I have a number of CD's of railroad themed music. Three of them form a trilogy and on one of the
CD's,Steve Goodman is singing his own song,
"City of New Orleans". It is great!
Folk music lost a genuine gem when Stevie
passed away.

CT

 

I have a version of it by Artese 'n Toad, from their CD "They Don't Write Songs About Trains Anymore." Good stuff. You are right, Ken, it should be an anthem for us fans.

 

Didn't Johnny Cash do a version of that song somewhere? seems like he did.

There was also a Bluegrass song I heard a while back that was called "Black Smoke Train." It was a song about the last run of a non-specific passenger train. It was a good song I try and see if I can find out who does the song.

[ December 07, 2005, 12:05 PM: Message edited by: SP Cabforward ]

 

Did someone say Elvis?