Editing Boogie-woogie (section)

====Railroad connection to Marshall and Harrison County, Texas====
A key to identifying the geographical area in which boogie-woogie originated is understanding the relationship of boogie-woogie music with the steam railroad, both in the sense of how the music might have been influenced by sounds associated with the arrival of steam locomotives as well as the cultural impact the sudden emergence of the railroad might have had.

The railroad did not arrive in northeast Texas as an extension of track from existing lines from the north or the east. Rather, the first railroad locomotives and iron rails were brought to northeast Texas via steamboats from New Orleans via the Mississippi and Red Rivers and Caddo Lake to Swanson's Landing, located on the Louisiana–Texas state line. Beginning with the formation of the Texas Western Railroad Company in Marshall, Texas, through the subsequent establishment in 1871 of the Texas and Pacific Railway company, which located its headquarters and shops there, Marshall was the only railroad hub in the Piney Woods of northeast Texas at the time the music developed. The sudden appearance of steam locomotives and the building of mainline tracks and tap lines to serve logging operations was pivotal to the creation of the music in terms of its sound and rhythm. It was also crucial to the rapid migration of the musical style from the rural barrel house camps to the cities and towns served by the Texas and Pacific Railway Company.

<blockquote>Although the neighboring states of Arkansas, Louisiana, and Missouri would also produce boogie-woogie players and their boogie-woogie tunes, and despite the fact that Chicago would become known as the center for this music through such pianists as [[Jimmy Yancey]], [[Albert Ammons]], and [[Meade Lux Lewis|Meade "Lux" Lewis]], Texas was home to an environment that fostered creation of boogie-style: the lumber, cattle, turpentine, and oil industries, all served by an expanding railway system from the northern corner of East Texas to the Gulf Coast and from the Louisiana border to [[Dallas]] and West Texas.<ref>David Oliphant, ''Texan Jazz'', University of Texas Press, 1996, p. 75.</ref></blockquote>

[[Alan Lomax]] wrote:

<blockquote>Anonymous black musicians, longing to grab a train and ride away from their troubles, incorporated the rhythms of the steam locomotive and the moan of their whistles into the new dance music they were playing in jukes and dance halls. Boogie-woogie forever changed piano playing, as ham-handed black piano players transformed the instrument into a polyrhythmic railroad train.<ref>Alan Lomax, Chapter 4, "Lonesome Whistles", p. 170, ''The Land Where the Blues Began'', New York: The New Press, 1993.</ref></blockquote>

In the 1986 television broadcast of Britain's ''[[The South Bank Show]]'' about boogie-woogie, music historian [[Paul Oliver]] noted:

<blockquote>Now the conductors were used to the [[logging camp]] pianists clamoring aboard, telling them a few stories, jumping off the train, getting into another logging camp, and playing again for eight hours, barrel house. In this way the music got around—all through Texas—and eventually, of course, out of Texas. Now when this new form of piano music came from Texas, it moved out towards Louisiana. It was brought by people like [[George W. Thomas]], an early pianist who was already living in New Orleans by about 1910 and writing New Orleans Hop Scop Blues", which really has some of the characteristics of the music that we came to know as Boogie.<ref name="Boogie Woogie 1986"/></blockquote>

Paul Oliver also wrote that George W. Thomas "composed the theme of the New Orleans Hop Scop Blues—in spite of its title—based on the blues he had heard played by the pianists of East Texas."<ref>Oliver, Paul, ''The Story of the Blues'', London, 1969, p. 85.</ref> On February 12, 2007, Oliver confirmed to John Tennison that it was [[Sippie Wallace]] who told Oliver that performances by East Texas pianists had formed the basis for George Thomas's "Hop Scop Blues".<ref>Interview with Paul Oliver by John Tennison, February 12, 2007.</ref>

Brothers [[George Washington Thomas|George Thomas]] and [[Hersal Thomas]] migrated from Texas to Chicago and brought boogie-woogie with them, influencing a number of pianists, including Jimmy Yancey, Meade Lux Lewis, and Albert Ammons.{{Citation needed|date=June 2021}} Many elements now recognized as foundational elements of boogie-woogie are present in their 1922 song "The Fives".{{Citation needed|date=June 2021}}