Steve Goodman was born on Chicago’s North Side and graduated from Maine East High School in Park Ridge, Illinois, in 1965, where he was a classmate of Hillary Clinton

" Banana Republics" "20th Century Is Almost Over"

In college he formed a cover band called The Juicy Fruits. He left college after one year to pursue his musical career. In 1968, Goodman began performing at the Earl of Old Town and attracted a following. That is where we saw him in the 1970s. By 1969, Goodman was a regular performer in Chicago, while attending Lake Forest College.

The Dutchman

He discovered the cause of his continuous fatigue was leukemia that led him to drop out of school again to pursue his music full-time. In September 1969 he met Nancy Pruter and they were married in February 1970. Though he experienced periods of remission, Goodman never felt that he was living on anything other than borrowed time, and some critics, listeners, and friends have said that his music reflects this sentiment.

Goodman’s songs first appeared on “Gathering at The Earl of Old Town,” an album produced by Chicago record company Dunwich in 1971. As a close friend of Earl Pionke, the owner of the folk music bar, Goodman performed at The Earl dozens of times, including customary New Year’s Eve concerts.

He also remained closely involved with Chicago’s Old Town School of Folk Music, where he had met and mentored his friend, John Prine. Arlo Guthrie’s version of Goodman’s song, about the Illinois Central’s City of New Orleans train, became a Top 20 hit in 1972 and provided Goodman with enough financial and artistic success to make music a full-time career. The song would become an American standard, covered by such musicians as Johnny Cash, Judy Collins, Chet Atkins, Lynn Anderson, and Willie Nelson. One of Goodman’s biggest hits was a song he didn’t write, “The Dutchman.” written by Michael Peter Smith.

He reached a wider audience as the opening act for Steve Martin while Martin was at the height of his stand-up popularity. Goodman won his second Grammy, for Best Contemporary Folk Album, in 1988 for “Unfinished Business,” a posthumous album. Many fans became aware of Goodman’s work through other artists such as Jimmy Buffett, who has recorded several of Goodman’s songs, as well as songs co-written with Buffett. Jackie DeShannon covered Goodman’s “Would You Like to Learn to Dance” on her 1972 album, “Jackie.” Goodman’s posthumously released album, “Santa Ana Winds,” included a tribute to the recently deceased Carl Martin, “You Better Get It While You Can (The Ballad of Carl Martin)”, celebrating the joy both found in their music, and a refrain of, “From the cradle to the crypt, Is a mighty short trip. So you better get it while you can.” Goodm was survived by his wife and three daughters. (Thanks To Gene Finnigan)

Steven Benjamin Goodman (July 25, 1948 - September 20, 1984)

Tweeter Center, Camden, New Jersey July 2, 2003

Greendale is the 27th studio album by Neil Young. Young and Crazy Horse's Greendale is a 10-song musical novel^[12] set in a fictional California seaside town of the same name. Based on the saga of the Green family, Greendale combines numerous themes on corruption, observation of the passing of time, environmentalism and mass media consolidation.

Falling From Above

Neil Young’s “Falling from Above” is a song that reaches into the heart of the American dream and finds it faltering under the weight of time and change. At first listen, the song may seem like a simple story about the Green family, but dig a little deeper, and it becomes clear that Young is painting a picture of an America at a crossroads.(SongLexicon)

Double E

Devil's Sidewalk

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