Talk:Midnight Special (song)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 |
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Songs, an attempt to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to songs on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, you can edit the article attached to this page, or visit the project page, where you can join the project and/or contribute to the discussion. |
| Start | This article has been rated as Start-Class on the assessment scale. |
 |
This article is part of WikiProject Texas, a WikiProject related to the U.S. state of Texas. |
| Start | This article has been rated as Start-Class on the quality scale. |
| Low | This article has been rated as Low-importance on the importance scale. |
 |
Midnight Special (song) is within the scope of WikiProject Roots music, an attempt to build a comprehensive guide on Wikipedia to roots music, folk music and traditional music. If you would like to participate, you can edit this article, or visit the project page, where you can join the project and/or contribute to the discussion. If you are new to editing Wikipedia visit the welcome page so as to become familier with the guidelines. | |
| Start | This article has been rated as Start-Class on the Project's quality scale. (If you rated the article please give a short summary at comments to explain the ratings and/or to identify the strengths and weaknesses.) |
|
| High | This article has been rated as High-importance on the Project's quality scale. | |
I Believe Pete Seeger originally recorded this song.--Jos Kolenberg 21:12, 3 July 2006 (UTC)
Read the Wikipedia entry for this song, and you will find that he did not.
Lonnie Donegan also recorded "Midnight Special" (available on LaserLight Digital/Delta Music Gmbh # 21040 (compilation 2001)). It's likely that this is how McCartney got acquainted with the song.
Has anyone else heard the story that the 'Midnight Special' was the electric chair in the prison? Executions were historically done at midnight and the electric chair was the 'salvation' as it was the only way to leave the terrible prison life.
- it's an urban legend. The Special was a train. Pustelnik (talk)! —Preceding comment was added at 18:04, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
one time, Matlock played the banjo and sang this song on his show. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.251.85.134 (talk) 01:42, 22 January 2008 (UTC) that's a damned dirty lie. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.180.30.134 (talk) 01:45, 22 January 2008 (UTC) Midnight Special is well-documented. It was written by Ledbelly when he was in the prison in Sugar Land. Jim Shortt, Music Columnist, the SCENE Magazine, Houston.
[edit] Sugar Land Prison
The article states the name comes from the local name for a Houston train passing by the Sugar Land Prison around midnight. Might be an urban legend. The problem being that the Sugar Land Prison was opened in April 1909 and the song predates that. Any ideas? SpaceFace32 (talk) 18:14, 26 March 2008 (UTC)
- See relevant information at the url [1] It states that lyrics to the song changed depending on when it was performed. It also states that the lines from 1905, which were documented by Odum, were only one part of the probable "well established traditional song" "with song elements being far older than the song itself". As I keep looking into the "early history" of music, I see this more and more. People changed things, borrowing from many sources to come up with their own version of a new/old song.Steve Pastor (talk) 20:01, 29 March 2008 (UTC)
[edit] Nora
In the version I learnt from my father, the girl in the song was Miss-A-Rosie. Anyone know who may have first recorded a version with this name? Plutonium27 (talk) 12:48, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
