I’ve come across a story which is so strange that I can hardly believe it’s true. It concerns Elizabeth Cotten, an American folk singer. I wouldn’t know anything about her if I hadn’t been so captivated by a song I heard on the radio that I went onto the internet to find out what it was. The song, Shake Sugaree, is practically unknown but it turned out that its author had written several well known songs including the classic Freight Train. This in an nutshell is Elizabeth’s Cotten’s story. She was born in 1895, the grand-daughter of a slave. Her parents were too poor to send her to school but she got a job which paid her 50 cents a month. When, after 2 years, her wage was put up to 75 cents she used the extra to buy a guitar, which she learned to play upside down as she was left-handed. When she was 12, she composed Freight Train. She got married at 15 and forgot about music until, 40 years later, she got a job as a maid with the folk music family, the Seegers. It was two years before the Seegers realised she could sing and play the guitar, but eventually they noticed her talent and made a recording of her songs. She gave her first public performance when she was in her sixties and her songs have been covered by many artists, including Bob Dylan, Peter Paul and Mary and The Grateful Dead. This is the American Dream come true.

I’m sure she doesn’t mind in the least, but Heather Mills McCartney was the butt of more cruel jibes this week. It was reported that her daughter Beatrice was showing musical talent, to which she replied “Yes, she gets it from me”.

Poor (as in ‘poor little rich girl’) Heather is unlikely to be rehabilitated soon and the story reminded me of a video which my daughter Jo made about her at the time of her divorce from Sir Paul, when she was rumoured to have taken him for £28m. Jo used the video to showcase Jimmy Choos by the Heroes of She, a track from their Never Going Home album. The song tells the story of a woman who, at the end of her marriage, is determined to wreak revenge on her ex by extracting from him every luxury she can think of. Jo very cleverly edited clips of Heather and Paul to match the words of the song- and although she was only 15 at the time the video attracted 5,000 views and lots of kind comments. Kind about the video that is, not so kind about poor Heather.

Everybody starts by copying. This fact is acknowledged, admitted and even bragged about by the modern greats in pop music- Lennon/McCartney, Jagger Richards and, above all, Bob Dylan. His latest album consists of demo recordings of his earliest songs and there’s scarcely an original tune among them. Dylan ransacked old blues and folk music, even Scottish folk songs- the tune for Blowing in The Wind comes from a Scottish folk ballad. In these early days Dylan used to borrow lyrics too. There’s a well known saying in pop
music- “where there’s a hit there’s a writ” and many of the great song writers have spent years in court fighting allegations of plagiarism. But Dylan was crafty- he only used stuff that was well out of copyright. The dead don’t sue. It wasn’t long before he found his own muse. This latest album is his 57th and I bought it as soon as it was released, as I have with all the 56 that came before, not caring a jot whether the songs were original or not.