June 17, 2023 (Song #1995): “Freight Train” by Elizabeth Cotten. T-47* brings me back to Linda Clifford, who was an amazing influence on my life. I had so many great guitar teachers and I’m grateful to them all: Hank Anderson, Pru Gabert at the Westport Y, Joan Slosberg, Terese Keenan, Joan Sprung, (plus a teacher at Yale who taught me classical guitar, but that didn’t really take) and the beautiful Linda Clifford. (Thank you, also, to my generous, supportive parents for researching, paying for and driving me to all these lessons.)
Most of you already know that I wanted to be a hippy: I wanted to look like Linda Ronstadt or Melanie Safka – and Linda Clifford was all of this but even prettier and nicer AND she actually came to my house (I started out going to her chic cottage on Rayfield Road, but that ended when we discovered that I was allergic to cats).
Linda taught us how to grow and eat mung beans, encouraged Alex to walk on her back, hugged me when she saw that I wrote “I love Linda Clifford” all over the cover of my spiral music notebook (much to the amusement of my friends) and, best of all, taught me how to fingerpick. I remember spending hours practicing this song in my bedroom, staring at my hands.
Here’s my version of “Freight Train” (with Josh Margolis, Peter Propp and Emily Mikesell) which we added to the end of “I’ve Been Working On The Railroad”, a song that I loved because it has 3 different melodies mashed together. I am including it today so that you can hear the results of Linda’s amazing teaching, but I do so hesitantly because this song is on the list of songs with a questionable past and disrespectful roots and I know that it needs to be reconsidered.
Happy birthday to Deirdre Daly and Pam Einarsen! xoxo