Talk:Hear My Train A Comin'

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Review: November 16, 2014. (Reviewed version).

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Title of the article[edit]

I think the "A" in the article's title needs to be changed to "a-" ("Hear My Train a-Comin'") as evidenced by the article on Bob Dylan's song "The Times They Are a-Changin". The same thing goes for "The Train Kept a-Rollin'".Chapa1985 (talk) 16:32, 13 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

The question has been raised at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Capital letters#Capitalization of a-prefixed words in titles. —Ojorojo (talk) 20:49, 14 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

At least the title should have the hyphen in it (A-Comin')...If I don't see any action within the next few days, I'll do it myself I guess. Chapa1985 (talk) 19:24, 18 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

It would be preferable to address the whole issue. What is the reasoning for a lower case "a"? It is not a standalone article, but part of a gerund. —Ojorojo (talk) 19:51, 18 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I assume that if in Dylan's hugely popular song "The Times They Are a-Changin'", the article must have been checked by a lot of editors, so if they agreed that "-a" was correct, it must be true. Maybe it turns out that both "A-" and "a-" are correct...but in that case, to have an 'A' without the hyphen is definitely not correct in the title of this article. Chapa1985 (talk) 20:14, 18 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

"Train Kept A-Rollin'" is a very popular song and a WP:Good Article (neither "Times" and "A Hard Rain's a-Gonna Fall" are GAs). I don't think it is a good idea to begin moving articles back and forth based solely on what may appear in another WP article. WP:WPNOTRS includes (bold in original): "Wikipedia employs no systematic mechanism for fact checking or accuracy. Thus Wikipedia articles (or Wikipedia mirrors) are not reliable sources for any purpose." —Ojorojo (talk) 20:29, 18 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

True enough but like I said above, it turns out that both "A-" and "a-" may be correct but to have an 'A' without the hyphen is probably not correct. Chapa1985 (talk) 15:09, 19 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

In my view we should disregard questions of "correctness" and consistency with other titles, and use the wording that is used on the original release of the track - which is "HEAR MY TRAIN A-COMIN'" - with a dash in A-COMIN'. Clearly we can't use all capitals for the article title, and it's a moot point as to whether the "a" in "a-Comin'" should be capitalised or not. But, I agree with Chapa1985 that there should definitely be a hyphen. Ghmyrtle (talk) 16:34, 19 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

"Train" was originally released on Rainbow Bridge, which uses "HEAR MY TRAIN A COMIN'" (no hyphen).[1] Subsequent releases on Band of Gypsys 2, BBC Sessions, Valleys of Neptune, People, Hell and Angels, and several live albums all consistently use "A Comin'" (except for the 1973 UK single release, which uses "HEAR MY TRAIN A' COMIN" (apostrophe) [2] However, I agree that the grammar sources[3][4][5] show the use of a hyphen as the most common construction. A third possibility has been raised at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Capital letters#Capitalization of a-prefixed words in titles. Perhaps this discussion should continue there. —Ojorojo (talk) 17:19, 19 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

A 12/21/15 RfC (closed 2/11/16) was unable to establish a consensus with the note "leave articles as they are without edit-warring, and wait for the second RFC" (Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Capital letters#RfC: Should an "a-prefixing" guideline be added to MOS:CT?). This article should remain "Hear My Train A Comin'" pending a consensus. —Ojorojo (talk) 15:35, 12 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]