Shifty Sailors in Maine Sunday!

Subject: Shifty Sailors in Maine Sunday!
From: Charley Noble
Date: 07 Jul 07 - 12:32 PM

The Shifty Sailors from Whidbey Island in Washinton will be singing again in Midcoast Maine at Seadogs Restaurant in Topsham this Sunday evening, July 8th. They are a massive group of singers, some 16 in number, who delight in singing songs of the sea.

We enjoyed them last evening at the Chocolate Church in Bath and plan to see them again.

Their songs of the sea range from traditional shanties and forebitters, to Victorian tear jerkers, to a show song or two, to contemporary songs. They do a spirited job on the stage and I can only but wonder what efforts have to be made to keep such a group from imploding!

The group was recently featured at the Wooden Boat Show at the Mystic SeaPort Museum and have appeared at several European sea music festivals.

I was happy to be able to swap two of my personal CD's with one of their members.

Cheerily,
Charley Noble

Subject: RE: Shifty Sailors in Maine Sunday!
From: Charley Noble
Date: 08 Jul 07 - 11:55 AM

Has anyone heard of this group before? Or was I hallucinating last Friday evening?

So many striped shirts, so little time!

Cheerily,
Charley Noble

Subject: RE: Shifty Sailors in Maine Sunday!
From: GUEST,Dr Price
Date: 08 Jul 07 - 07:14 PM

No, Charley, you are not hallucinating! I caught the Shifty Sailors last summer at Llantrisant Folk Club, South Wales, and they are a lot of fun. They even brought their wives, so the place was mighty crowded! With 16 shantymen, the greatest job we had was stopping them falling off...

Subject: RE: Shifty Sailors in Maine Sunday!
From: Charley Noble
Date: 08 Jul 07 - 10:44 PM

Dr. Price-

Oh, good! "Cos I saw them again holding forth at one of our local taverns this evening. Recurring hullucinations are not something I crave.

They did a great job of singing Keith Marsden's song "Bring Us a Barrel" fanning out during the chorus among the tavern crowd and stacking glasses high.

I shudder to think of how they decide to do anything. I work with a group of six and a six-headed turtle is difficult enough to navigate from one place to another.

I had fun chorusing along with the wives!

Cheerily,
Charley Noble

Subject: RE: Shifty Sailors in Maine Sunday!
From: GUEST,Marc
Date: 09 Jul 07 - 08:12 AM

Featured at Mystic Seaport?

Subject: RE: Shifty Sailors in Maine Sunday!
From: Charley Noble
Date: 09 Jul 07 - 09:26 AM

Marc-

"Featured at Mystic Seaport?"

As I mentioned above, they were hired by the organizers of the recent Wooden Boat Show. They had an "interesting time" navigating between Museum staff and Wooden Boat staff, not to mention those wonderful Museum Store managers out in San Diego. Nuff said!

Cheerily,
Charley Noble

Subject: RE: Shifty Sailors in Maine Sunday!
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Jul 07 - 10:10 AM

Hey, Charley,

Yes I know of them! The perform a song of my father's, his "Notice to Mariners." It's on one of their CDs (correctly credited to John Dwyer but saying permission is granted by Maggie "Lewis" -- no such person in this Dwyer household!)

I will note that I did allow them to change a word, the location of the song. They reset it on Whidbey. My dad was quite adamant that songs not be altered, but this group enjoys it and I couldn't see the harm. It had been published elsewhere already with the correct words.

SRS