Night train james brown wikipedia biography

1951 blues record

"Night Train (composition)" and "Night Train (instrumental)" redirect here. For other songs with the same title, see Night Train (disambiguation).

"Night Train" is a twelve-bar blues instrumental standard first recorded by Jimmy Forrest in 1951.

Night train 80s song

Origins and development

"Night Train" has a long and complicated history. The piece's opening riff was first recorded in 1940 by a small group led by Duke Ellington sideman Johnny Hodges, under the title "That's the Blues, Old Man".

Ellington used the same riff as the opening and closing theme of a longer-form composition, "Happy-Go-Lucky Local", that was itself one of four parts of his 1946 Deep South Suite. Jimmy Forrest was part of Ellington's band when it performed this composition, which has a long tenor saxophone break in the middle.

After leaving Ellington, Forrest recorded "Night Train" on United Records, and his record was the fifth best selling R&B