Southbound Passenger Train

artist:Birmingham Jubilee Singers, Doc Watson

, writer:Traditional, Arthel Layne Watson

Chords:

 {t:Southbound Passenger Train}
{artist:}
{key: F}
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NqdzWRsqtxAF so capo 2
Acapella version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z8DPk8ykuuY
{c: Thanks to Geoff Vaughan}
All Aboard…count 1,2 …..1,2,3     
[F] I’m gonna ride, {sob}(gonna ride){eob}, I mean, {sob}(I mean){eob}
[G] That Southbound Passenger Train, 
.                                  {sob}(that Southbound Passenger Train){eob}
[C7] I’m gonna buy me a ticket just as long as my arm
[F] I’m gonna ride that train, baby, all night long.
[F] I’m gonna ride, {sob}(gonna ride){eob}, I mean {sob}(I mean){eob}
[G] That South Bound Passenger Train, 
.                                  {sob}(that Southbound Passenger Train){eob}
[Bb7] Until I hear that old conductor say “All [C] out for Birming-[F]-ham”. 

[F] I got a letter from my [C7] doll babe. Now, that a lives in Birming-[F]-ham
[F] She’s the cutest little [C7] doll babe. Way down in Birming-[F]-ham.
[NC] Well, she so sweet and she’s so neat 
[NC] That when she walks she knock-a-you off your feet.
[F] She Is some ma-[C7]-ma, way down from Birming-[F]-ham .

[F] I’m gonna ride, {sob}(gonna ride){eob}), I mean {sob}(I mean){eob}
[G] That South Bound Passenger Train, 
.                                  {sob}(that Southbound Passenger Train){eob}
[C7] I Hear the engineer say, “Put your shovel in the coal.
[F] Put your head out the window watch the [C7] drivers roll” [F].
[F] I’m gonna ride, {sob}(gonna ride){eob}, I mean {sob}(I mean){eob}
[G] That South Bound Passenger Train, 
.                                  {sob}(that Southbound Passenger Train){eob})
[Bb7] Until I hear that old conductor say ”All [C7] Out For Birming-[F]-ham.”
[F] When I hear that whistle [C7] blow: (woohoo) it’s a music to my [F] ears.
[F] And now when I’m [C] with my doll babe, I don’t shed no lonesome tear. [F]

[NC] What is she now?
[NC] Well, she so sweet and she’s so neat 
[NC] That when she walks she knock-a-you off your feet.
[F] She is some ma-[C7]-ma, way down from Birming-[F]-ham.
[F] I’m gonna ride, {sob}(gonna ride){eob}), I mean, {sob}(I mean){eob}
[G]That Southbound Passenger Train, 
.                                 {sob}(that Southbound Passenger Train){eob}
[C7] I’m gonna buy me a ticket just as long as my arm 
[F] I’m gonna ride that train, baby, all night long           
[F] I’m gonna ride, {sob}(gonna ride){eob}, I mean {sob}(I mean){eob}
[G] That South Bound Passenger Train, 
.                                {sob}(that Southbound Passenger Train){eob}   (slowing for last line)
[Bb7] Until I hear that old conductor say “All [C7] out for Birming-[F]-ham”.

Song Info

Title: Southbound Passenger Train

Artist: Birmingham Jubilee Singers, Doc Watson

Writer: Traditional, Arthel Layne Watson

Song Types: Country, Folk

Key: F

Info: From folkarchivist.blogspot.com:

I first heard this barbershop-harmony style song on Doc Watson's album "Doc and the Boys" from the 1970s (reissued on CD along with "Live and Pickin'" and one bonus track) and have since tried to locate Doc's original source for that song.

In live recordings, like one from Rochester (I presume Rochester, NY) from the mid-1970s, Doc identfies his source as a record by a group called "Birmingham Boys" -- so far, I have been unable to locate a group by that  specific name.

However, there's a recording by the BIRMINGHAM JUBILEE SINGERS as the "BIRMINGHAM QUARTET" (Co 14154, recorded in Atlanta, GA, on April 23, 1926) which couples a song entitled "Southbound Train" with "Birmingham Boys", making it rather likely that this is the recording Doc is referring to.

A variant of the song was recorded under the title "Pullman Passenger Train" by the PULLMAN PORTERS QUARTETTE (Chicago, IL, 1927), another one by BRYANT'S JUBILEE QUARTET/QUINTETTE as "Southbound Passenger Train" in Richmond, IN, c. April 24, 1928, and once again (as "THE FAMOUS GARLAND JUBILEE SINGERS") in New York, NY, March 19, 1931, reproducing their 1928 arrangement note for note (even though the high tenor and low bass singers do not seem identical to those on the previous recording).

Nothing is known about the identities of the Pullman Porters Quartette, nor the unidentified group who performed a further variant in the 1931 Laurel & Hardy movie "Pardon Us".

And to even further complicate matters, the song itself (not even mentioned in Norm Cohen's otherwise excellent Long Steel Rail: The Railroad in American Folksong) seems to be a variant of a song recorded by The Carolina Twins as "Southern Jack" (reissued on "Gastonia Gallop", but unfortunately, so far, missing from my collection).

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Southbound Passenger Train

artist:Birmingham Jubilee Singers, Doc Watson

, writer:Traditional, Arthel Layne Watson

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