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(詳細はpassenger train ''Midnight Special'' and its "ever-loving light" (sometimes "ever-living light"). :Let the Midnight Special shine her light on me, :Let the Midnight Special shine her ever-loving light on me. (Traditional) The song is historically performed in the country-blues style from the viewpoint of the prisoner and has been covered by many artists. ==History== Lyrics appearing in the song were first recorded in print by Howard Odum in 1905.〔Oliver, ''Songster and Saints'', p. 247: "An example of this form of nodal ballad is ''The Midnight Special'', a prison song known in penitentiaries in many parts of the South. One stanza fragment which relates to the song was noted by Howard Odum about 1905 and published in his 1911 collection."〕 :''Get up in the mornin' when ding dong rings,'' :''Look at table — see the same damn thing.'' The first printed reference to the song itself was in a 1923 issue of ''Adventure'' magazine, a three-times-a-month pulp magazine published by the Ridgway Company.〔Cohen, ''Long Steel Rail'', p 479: "The earliest reference to the song I have found was in a letter to Robert W. Gordon, conducting the column 'Old Songs That Men Have Sung' in ''Adventure'' magazine. Dated August 3, 1923, the requested additional verses ..."〕 In 1927 Carl Sandburg published two different versions of "Midnight Special" in his ''The American Songbag'', the first published versions.〔Cohen, ''Long Steel Rail'', p 479: "Carl Sandburg published two variants in his 1927 anthology, ''American Songbag'', both without attribution."〕 The song was first commercially recorded on the OKeh label in 1926 as "Pistol Pete's Midnight Special" by Dave "Pistol Pete" Cutrell (a member of ''McGinty's Oklahoma Cow Boy Band'').〔Russel, ''Country Music Records'', p. 240: "Dave Cutrell; St. Louis, MO; May 1926; 9650-A; 'Pistol Pete's Midnight Special'; Despite the label credit to McGint'y Oklahoma Cow Boy Band as accompanists, the instrumentation is as shown. Rev. Okeh 45057 by McGinty's Oklahoma Cow Boy Band ..."〕 Cutrell follows the traditional song except for semi-comedic stanzas about McGinty and Gray and "a cowboy band".〔Cutrell, "Pistol Pete's Midnight Special", British Archive of Country Music.〕 :''Now, Mister McGinty is a good man,'' :''But he's run away now with a cowboy band.'' ::''Refrain''〔 :''Now Otto Gray, he's a Stillwater man,'' :''But he's manager now of a cowboy band.'' ::''Refrain''〔 In March 1929, the band, now ''Otto Gray and the Oklahoma Cowboys'', recorded the song again, this time with the traditional title using only the traditional lyrics.〔Waltz, ''The Traditional Ballad Index'': "McGinty's Oklahoma Cowboy Band (now led by Otto Gray), "The Midnight Special" (Vocalion 5337; c. 1929)."〕 Sam Collins recorded the song commercially in 1927 under the title "The Midnight Special Blues" for Gennett Records.〔(Discography ) of Sam Collins (musician) by Stefan Wirz.〕 His version also follows the traditional style. His is the first to name the woman in the story, Little Nora, and he refers to the ''Midnight Special's'' "ever-living" light. :''Yonder come a Little Nora. How in the world do you know?'' :''I know by the apron and the dress she wears.''〔Collins, "Midnight Special Blues".〕 In 1934 Huddie William "Lead Belly" Ledbetter recorded a version of the song at Angola Prison for John and Alan Lomax, who mistakenly attributed it to him as the author. However, Ledbetter, for his Angola session, appears to have inserted several stanzas relating to a 1923 Houston jailbreak into the traditional song.〔Cohen, ''Long Steel Rail'', p. 480: "McCormick's researchers do not prove that the song "The Midnight Special" originated at the time of this 1923 jailbreak. It seems more probable that Lead Belly and others set the details of that event into the framework of an earlier, well-established traditional song. The strongest evidence for this assumption is that the song appeared widely throughout the South within a very few years after 1923, and invariably in versions that did not mention any of the individual associated with the Houston events of 1923."〕 Ledbetter recorded at least three versions of the song, one with the Golden Gate Quartet, a gospel group (recorded for RCA at Victor Studio #2, New York City, June 15, 1940). John and Alan Lomax, in their book, ''Best Loved American Folk Songs'', told a credible story identifying the ''Midnight Special'' as a train from Houston shining its light into a cell in the Sugar Land Prison. They also describe Ledbetter's version as "the Negro jailbird's ballad to match ''Hard Times Poor Boy.'' Like so many American folk songs, its hero is not a man but a train." The light of the train is seen as the light of salvation, the train which could take them away from the prison walls. It is highly reminiscent of the imagery of such gospel songs as ''Let the Light from your Lighthouse Shine on Me.'' Carl Sandburg had a different view. He believed the subject of the song would rather be run over by a train than spend more time in jail.〔Waltz, ''The Traditional Ballad Index'': "Carl Sandburg, on the other hand, believes that the song refers to suicide: That the convict would rather be dead under the wheels of the train than spend another twenty years in prison."〕 The song, as popularized by Ledbetter, has many parallel lines to other prison songs. It is essentially the same song as "De Funiac Blues," sung and played by Burruss Johnson and recorded by John Lomax at the Raiford State Penitentiary in Florida on 2 June 1939. Many of the lines appear in prison work songs such as "Jumpin Judy," "Ain't That Berta," "Oh Berta" and "Yon' Comes de Sargent." These songs, including Ledbetter's "Midnight Special." are composite. They mix standard prison song verses indiscriminately. Many of these component pieces have become canonized in the blues idiom and appear in mutated forms regularly in blues lyrics. Although later versions place the locale of the song near Houston, early versions such as "Walk Right In Belmont" (Wilmer Watts; Frank Wilson, 1927) and "North Carolina Blues" (Roy Martin, 1930) — both essentially the same song as "Midnight Special" — place it in North Carolina.〔Cohen, ''Long Steel Rail'', p 479: One version, collected from prisoners at the state prison at Parchman, Mississippi, has this chorus: :''Let the Midnight Special shine her light on me,'' :''You take the Illinois Central, and come to Kankakee.''〕 Most of the early versions, however, have no particular location. Only one recording, collected by the Lomaxes at the Mississippi State Penitentiary, actually identifies the railroad operating the ''Midnight Special'' — the Illinois Central which had a route through Mississippi.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Midnight Special (song)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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