Songwriter recalls the sound of a passing train

‘‘When I think about the train, and all the things that make us who we are ... it was just really easy for me,” said Freedman Gruber, who still lives in Silver Spring. ‘‘It was something I could really sink my teeth into.”

Gottlieb said he knew early on that music would be an important part in telling the story of the railroad. The challenge was that there were very few songs recorded about the B&O, and none Gottlieb found about the Silver Spring station.

He then decided to find local artists and producers to create a soundtrack of mostly original swing and folk songs that would be compatible with the film. Freedman Gruber and her husband, Jeff Gruber, a producer with Silver Spring-based Blue House Productions, put the score together and recruited other artists.

‘‘I really studied the timeline, did research on the Internet, and talked to people to find out what it was really like,” Jeff Gruber said.

Artists who appear on the soundtrack include Amy Shook, Felicia Carter and Roger Dale. Jimmy Cooney, the line producer for the film, said that ‘‘In the Diner,” a song about the diner car experience in the steam engine era written by Shook and Carter, already has a music video.

‘‘The songs can definitely help tell the story in place of narration,” Cooney said.

Other songs in the film tell the history of the renovation of the station, building the railroad across the country and of 1945, the year the Silver Spring station that stands today was built.

Song for a station

One song in the film, ‘‘Next Stop: Silver Spring,” is considered the film’s theme and opens and closes the documentary. It was written and performed by Silver Spring resident Sharon Freedman Gruber:

‘‘You know I’m going away and I just might be gone for so long.

It’s time for me to take that train to where I belong.

You see I’ve lost my way and now I cannot stay.

I’ve seen those dusty fields and sang for meals in deep Missouri.

Remember in Chicago town we didn’t have to worry?

But now I’m going home, the place where I belong,

from the other side of other dreams, to the other side of where it seems...

Silver Spring, where my heart and soul was fed,

Silver Spring, hope I wake up there instead,

with that train whistle in my head.”

Lyrics courtesy of Sharon Freedman Gruber