My wife Barbara and I recently made our first trip to Montréal – six nights, what a treat! In planning for this vacation, I never once gave a thought to music, let alone early Seventies Top Forty hits. Yet, an encounter with a local about a song from 1972 turned out to be a memorable learning moment for me.
We stayed in Old Montréal, just a block from the main pedestrian-only thoroughfare, Rue Saint-Paul, with the Saint Lawrence River just a bit further down the hill. The cobblestone streets, buildings reaching back a couple of hundred years and the French language in the air really did make us feel like we were in Europe. A comforting aspect for the two of us, as we do not speak French, was that everyone we talked to would immediately switch to English when communicating with us. Our experience is borne out by demographic data showing that over half of Montréal’s residents speak both French and English.
We were struck by the depth of multi-culturalism in the city. From our limited experience, it seems to be a true melting pot of diverse peoples. And the overall friendly vibe was one of welcome to Montreal – have a good time. That’s with the exception of one surly clerk in a dépanneur (convenience store).
It is known as a safe city, and we certainly felt relaxed there. Despite large crowds of people in the tourist areas, there was almost zero police presence. Maybe they were there and in plain clothes, but it wasn’t obvious. A couple of times, we saw a police car, but the only uniformed officers we saw were on one occasion inside a subway station. There was also none of the incessant sirens and constant emergency response commotion typical in cities such as D.C. and New York.
A visit to the city’s museum of archaeology and history, Musée Pointe-à-Callière, was simply amazing. It is built above archaeological remains at a location that initially was home to Indigenous people and then was the site of the first buildings erected by the arrivals from Europe. Spending a few hours in this museum truly gave us a real sense of place. Other high points of our week included a visit to the beautiful Notre-Dame Basilica (Basilique Notre-Dame de Montréal), an evening at Cirque du Soleil and a fun but tiring day trip via Gray Line to Québec City. We also had fantastic meals at Old Montréal’s flowers and plant-filled Jardin Nelson restaurant (the lemon-flavored dessert, gâteau fleur de citron, was out of this world) and in Québec City at La Buche, which features traditional hearty Québécoise cuisine.
Through reading about Montréal in advance of the trip and talking to others who had been there, we knew that we wanted to visit the city’s botanical garden (Jardin Botanique), one of the largest in the world. And it is there that I had my Americana music lesson.
The garden is located a distance from Old Montréal and is situated across the road from the Olympic Stadium, built for the 1976 Summer Olympics. Although we could have taken the subway to get there, we opted to take a taxi. On the way, the driver had a French-language radio station on, and the songs we heard were sung in French, except when Ed Sheeran popped-up.
When we arrived at the garden, there was a long line leading to the ticket windows. Huge signs were posted encouraging those in line to purchase their tickets (billets) online to avoid waiting. As Barbara worked through the steps on her cell phone to purchase the tickets, I overheard a garden employee in a nearby information booth say something about the song, City of New Orleans. That startled me. I love that song!
Much of my adolescence was spent listening to Top Forty radio on Philadelphia’s WFIL-56. To say that I was immersed in that music is a bit of an understatement. Today, while I may have forgotten what happened last week, I can still recite the lyrics to many of those songs that climbed the charts half a century ago. And City of New Orleans stands out to me as something special from that era.
It was written by Steve Goodman, a folksinger from Chicago, and the 1972 hit version was performed by Arlo Guthrie, the son of the legendary Woody Guthrie. The song, a very melodic country-folk creation, is about a real train that is named in the title. It includes the memorable refrain:
Good morning, America, how are ya?
Said don’t you know me? I’m your native son.
The Guthrie single rose to number 18 on the Billboard pop chart, and as I listened in Philly, the words and melody etched themselves permanently in my mind.
After Barbara secured the tickets online, we walked to the info booth to pick up a map of the garden. While the gentleman was pulling one out for us, I mentioned that I heard him say something about the song, and that it was one of my favorites. I name-checked Goodman and Guthrie, expecting him to nod in agreement, but he went off in another direction, telling me about Joe Dassin and his version of the song that had nothing to do with trains. Dassin, he told me, was an American singer who recorded in French and became very popular in France (and apparently in Québec) before dying at a very young age. Our friendly info booth guy whipped out a Sharpie and printed in the margin of the map:
Joe Dassin
Salut Les Amoureux
He said that the title means something along the lines of hello, lovers. No train is involved.
This was interesting information to learn, and I said something again about the Arlo Guthrie version. His reply was that he was familiar with the English-language version by Willie Nelson. I thought to myself, “Willie Nelson?” This nice French-Canadian man must have been confused. So, I thanked him for the map, and we left to enter the garden.
After several marvelous hours touring the garden and eating lunch in its restaurant, we returned to our hotel for some rest. Of course, I went straight to the Internet to search for Joe Dassin, and found multiple YouTube videos of his Salut Les Amoureux. It sounded really nice, although it was surprising that someone could have taken this iconic railroad song and removed the railroad.
Then, I searched for Willie Nelson and was very surprised to see that he had, indeed, recorded the song City of New Orleans. Not only had he recorded it, but it was a number one Billboard country hit in 1984. The album it came from was even titled, City of New Orleans. Guess I missed that, as I have probably missed scads of other great music because it was categorized as country.
It’s a bit embarrassing to confess that I had such a gap in my knowledge of a song that I love. Thanks to my new friend at Jardin Botanique, that void has now been filled.