I directed the creation of an "album" of sailor chanties, which is now released as:

"Songs of the Windlass: Classic Chanties of Shipboard Labor."

It's intended to serve a few purposes, among them:

-To really focus in on the brake windlass, a shipboard device (i.e. at which chanties were regularly sung) whose history and mechanics are quite unfamiliar to most people. That includes today's chanty-singing people. Even when sailor chanties are discussed in relation to their historical work applications, it seems to me that "capstan" and "halyards" get the most recognition while the windlass is only vaguely acknowledged and even though the windlass was where the biggest chunk of chanty singing on ships was happening during the golden years of chanties.

-Not to dredge up nifty "rare," "newly discovered" items but to re-emphasize a core of representative chanties. Representative of what? Of chanties documented to have gone with the windlass, that go *well* with the windlass in their form and style, that represent basic traits of the broader genre, that were popular repertoire and especially during the foundational and zenith time period (1830s-70s, give or take). Tying chanty development to the windlass's development keeps things solid. In a few cases, the _arrangements_ *will* sound new, so far as they try to uncover what source analysis suggested to me might to be more accurate tunes and rhythms (i.e. as compared to some popularized revival melodies that diverged from evidence and/or oral tradition).

-To suggest models for performance in ways that might hew closely to realistic/historical practical aspects, not as a prescription for how someone should perform but as an aide for keeping consideration of the tradition in mind -- and avoiding some accretions produced by in the folk revival-- *so far as* mixing in newer stuff unconsciously can cloud insight into the older stuff. For example, the lyrics stick to the language or specific noted texts of more reliable primary/period documents. Even though I'm a HUGE proponent of people today singing whatever words they want and, better yet, making up new words suiting current things, on the album I sought a more "pure" 19th century language unclouded by lyrics thrown in by collection editors of the 20th century etc.

-To create a resource people can use freely for educational and creative purposes. The recordings are not "public domain" but they are licensed under Creative Commons for people to do whatever they want with them, with the only requirement being to cite the source.

The album can be streamed or downloaded (free) here on SoundCloud.

There's a big "liner notes" packet (PDF) linked from the info box on the album page. It helps a lot to explain the background context as to why the windlass was important and how the chosen chanties fit into its story.