'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: Charley Noble
Date: 26 Oct 10 - 08:11 PM

Thanks, Terry, for your contribution.

Charley Noble

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: kendall
Date: 26 Oct 10 - 08:14 PM

Thanks Nancy, please do post those lyrics. Excellent song.

I wonder if "The Siren's Song" might qualify?

Subject: Lyr Add: WISCASSET SCHOONERS
From: Nancy King
Date: 26 Oct 10 - 09:58 PM

OK, here goes. The schooners of the song, "Hesper" and "Luther Little," were beached in Wiscasset, Maine, in 1932, and remained there, an unlikely tourist attraction, until the debris from the disintigrating hulks became a hazard to navigation. They were finally demolished in 1998. I remember sneaking aboard them in the early 1960s with Lois and some other friends -- strictly forbidden, but fascinating and fun. Lois wrote the song in 1985. Gordon sings a couple of words slightly differently on the "Schooners" CD, but this is the way the lyrics are printed in the accompanying booklet:


WISCASSET SCHOONERS
(Lois Lyman)

Do you remember riding home before a dying summer breeze,
Your topsails gleaming golden, setting sun among the trees,
And the osprey wheeling slowly through the shadows by the shore,
Where the towering cliffs of granite plunge ten fathoms deep or more,
And the eddies swirl and flow down below.

You were solid-built of Douglas fir and oak and yellow pine,
Two hundred feet, sailed by a crew that numbered only nine,
Hauling lumber through your timberports, and dyewood from the south
Running home from Norfolk bringing coal to heat the north
And whatever they could stow down below.

But the winter is upon you now, and time is passing slow
And the tides ebb and flow down below.

You served them well for fifteen years, your canvas all unfurled
When New England sailing ships were found in ports around the world,
But spars gave way to smokestacks, clouds of white to black and grey,
There was nothing left for you to do but waste your time away,
And the rot was spreading slow down below.

And the winter...

From Wiscasset to the China Lakes the Narrow Gauge did run,
To push it northward to Quebec was old Frank Winter's plan--
And schooners were to bring his cargoes in to meet the train,
When he found you idle on the dock, he brought you down to Maine
Where the tides ebb and flow down below.

You know he tried the best he could, but he just couldn't make it pay
So he ran you both aground, and turned around and walked away;
You've been waiting here for fifty years, but no one set you free,
Now you're broken down and dying, lying open to the sea,
And the tides ebb and flow down below.

And the winter...

The people come to stare at you with wonder in their eyes
For times have changed since men knew how to work a ship your size.
The seas you sailed are running black; in time we'll know our loss--
It's too late now for you, and is it too late now for us?
Can you teach us what you know before you go?

For the winter is upon you now, and time is passing slow
And the tides ebb and flow down below. (twice)

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: kendall
Date: 27 Oct 10 - 07:33 AM

I remember driving by those hulks and wondering about them.
This is an excellent song and I'd like to see it become very well known.

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: janemick
Date: 27 Oct 10 - 03:31 PM

chicken on a raft, grey funnel line and the oggy man by Cyril T
awnwy

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: Tim Leaning
Date: 27 Oct 10 - 03:39 PM

http://www.myspace.com/timleaning


Self serving link to a song called three weeks.
its about the darker side of the fishing trade.

It comes from the way the trawlers used to be away at sea for three weeks then home for three days.

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: GUEST,Alan Whittle
Date: 27 Oct 10 - 04:05 PM

I wrote a chorus to the poem ny John Masefield about Long John Siver.

access it here:-

http://www.bigalwhittle.co.uk/id24.html

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: Charley Noble
Date: 27 Oct 10 - 10:31 PM

Nancy and Kendall-

I'm thinking about pulling together all the photographs my brother and I made of the Wiscasset schooners in the early 1960's for a Facebook album. It really was a shame that the Town of Wiscasset never spent a cent trying to preserve them or construct a replica.

Charley Noble

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: Trunklesqueezer
Date: 16 Feb 12 - 12:17 AM

If I'm not mistaken, 'The Birkenhead Drill' was written by Ken Stephens from somewhere near Southampton.

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: Ross Campbell
Date: 16 Feb 12 - 07:39 AM

YouTube - Birkenhead drill

Subject: Lyr Add: DRINK TO THE MEN WHO'VE GONE ASHORE
From: Charley Noble
Date: 16 Feb 12 - 08:04 AM

Oh my, I've missed this thread! Thanks for reviving it, Ron. There are a lot of songs that have surfaced in the last year and a half. Here's one of my favorite new ones, inspired by a poem by marine engineer and writer William McFee who provided the chorus (copy and paste into WORD/TIMES/12 to line up chords):

By William McFee, 1909
From Songs of the Sea and Sailors' Chanteys, edited by Robert Frothingham, published by Houghton Mifflin Co., Cambridge, US, © 1924, p. 208; first published in The New York Evening Post.
Verses by Charles Ipcar, © 2011
Tune: Charles Ipcar, © 2011
Key: Em (9/Gm)

DRINK TO THE MEN WHO'VE GONE ASHORE

Dm--C--Dm-------C---F-----Dm--C---- Dm
Now the Skipper and Chief have gone ashore
-----------------F----C-Dm
They're off to Sail-or-town,
--------Gm--------------------Dm---F-Dm
So I'll tell you a tale of Old Sing-a-pore,
-------------C---Dm-C-----Dm
While we pass the bottle round.
---Gm----------------------Dm-F-Dm
I'll tell you a tale of Old Sing-a-pore,
----Gm-------------Dm
Of famous Malay Street,
------Gm---------------Dm-F--Dm
With its samshu dives by the score,
-----------C---Dm-C------Dm
And the rick-sha girls so sweet.

Chorus:

Dm-------C------F----Dm--- C-----Dm
So drink to the men who've gone ashore,
--------------------F-------C----Dm
With a one-two-three – rum-tum!
Gm--------------------------Dm--F------Dm
Half a dozen men on the mess room floor,
C-----------------------------F----C-Dm
Drink to the men who've gone a-shore,
Gm-------------------------Dm-----F--Dm
Six good men with their throats all sore –
----C--Dm-C---------Dm
Yo ho for a bottle o' rum!

As I was cruising down the Street,
After a drop or twa,
I spied a girl just like a pearl,
Alone in a Jin-rick-sha.
So pretty and neat with long black hair,
Dressed in silks so fine,
She smiled at me and waved her hand,
And her jade green eyes did shine. (CHO)

So I climbed aboard and off we rolled,
Through the shadows of the night;
Till we fetched up to her compound gate,
Gleaming in the pale moonlight.
She pulled the cord and a gong did sound,
The dragon gate swung wide;
She took my hand and led me on
To her chamber deep inside. (CHO)

She brought me a glass of samshu wine,
And smiled at me again;
She knelt beside me on the mat
And my head began to spin;
Now when I awoke, late next morn,
My head was still aflame;
I was lying naked on the quay,
Bruised and in great pain. (CHO)

So heed my warning, one and all,
If you're cruising Singapore,
Don't cha spend your nights with the rick-sha girls,
They'll rock and roll you sure;
Don't cha spend your nights with the rick-sha girls,
Don't cruise Old Singapore,
But get married, lads, and settle down,
And go to sea no more,
And go to sea no more!

"Samshu," according to Stan Hugill, is a Chinese bean-wine, very fiery and potent.

And here's a link to a MP3 sample: http://www.charlieipcar.com/lyrics/drink_men.htm

Cheerily,
Charley Noble

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: Greg B
Date: 16 Feb 12 - 04:56 PM

My old pal and band-mate Skip Henderson has written some dandy ditties as well as having put the Sailor's and Fisher's Hornpipes together in such a fashion as to be given the final music credit on "Pirates of the Caribbean 2" (think of the bar-fight scene).

I want also to give a nod to Stan Rogers' "White Squall." One of those songs that really evokes the visual imagination as the story unfolds.

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: The Sandman
Date: 16 Feb 12 - 05:00 PM

fastnet old fastnet, C FoxSmith, tuneRMileshttps://sites.google.com/site/thefastnetmaritimeandfolkfest/ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MqmLNHqYuKo

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 16 Feb 12 - 05:34 PM

Re Edmond Fitzgerald..I keep coming upon the name in my genealogy "research" of Irish families in NE Iowa...lots of Fitzgeralds from Dingle area..I know the ship was named after the father of the banker? Insurance agent? Some financial man..does anyone know the history of this Fitzgerald and from whence he came? mg

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: sciencegeek
Date: 16 Feb 12 - 08:41 PM

mg,

This from wiki:
Northwestern named the boat after President and Chairman of the Board, Edmund Fitzgerald. Fitzgerald's grandfather had been a lake captain and his father owned the Milwaukee Drydock Company that built and repaired ships.[19] More than 15,000 people attended the Fitzgerald's christening and launch ceremony on June 7, 1958. The event was plagued by misfortune. When Elizabeth Fitzgerald, wife of Edmund Fitzgerald, tried to christen the boat by smashing a champagne bottle over the bow, it took her three attempts to break it. A delay of 36 minutes followed while the shipyard crew struggled to release the keel blocks. Upon sideways launch, the boat crashed violently into a pier.

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: EBarnacle
Date: 17 Feb 12 - 02:42 PM

Shortly after Pride of Baltimore I went down, I wrote "The Loss of the Pride Of Baltimore" as a pumping chantey.

Here's the first verse and chorus:

o-oh have you heard the news, me Johnny,
Pride's gone down.
She went on down in a dead white squall,
Pride's gone down.

O-oh Prid's gone down, Me Johnny,
Pride's gone down;
Sh'll not come home to Baltimore,
Pride's gone down.

The first time I sang this in public was a a pub sing in Mystic, shortly after the event. I had trouble getting through the song because it choked me up and, apparently had the same effect on many of the others in the room. I don't drag it out often as it is too powerful.

Kendall, the melody of Ashes on the Sea sounds an awful lot like the melody of "Lorena." Is it based on that or just coincidence?

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: GUEST,John Foxen
Date: 18 Feb 12 - 09:02 AM

To add to the list of women composers:
Sisters Unlimited have their wonderful Childbirth Shanty (No Bed of Roses) but it may be a little strong for the menfolk.
And Margaret Foxen co-wrote a song about one of Britain's greatest maritime heroes, John Darwin, who set off one day in his canoe from Seaton In Carew and absent-mindedly sailed all the way to Central America

Paddle Off To Panama

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: stallion
Date: 19 Feb 12 - 05:13 AM

Just read through this thread and can't believe that Linda Kelly's Sweet Minerva and Northern Tide are not mentioned, truth is that once you hear Hissyfit doing Sweet Minerva there is little else one can do with it, it is just wonderful, I have heard many people sing Northern Tide in many different styles and as far as I have heard no-one has murdered it.

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: Crane Driver
Date: 19 Feb 12 - 05:21 AM

The Shanty UK website now has a 'songwriters' section with new sea songs and shanties available as pdf files to download (by permission of the authors) and in some cases midi files. Not many writers yet, but submissions welcomed if your main concern is to get your songs known and sung.

Andrew

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: GUEST,Badjelly
Date: 24 Nov 12 - 06:56 PM

Aw thanks. Also recorded 2010 by Portsmouth Shanty Men.

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 24 Nov 12 - 09:16 PM

Davy Steele wrote Farewell to the Haven and Heave Ya Ho
Scott Murray - Guiding Light
John Watt - Shores of the Forth (not Matt Armour as a previous poster said)
Matt Armour - Generations of Change includes a verse about fishing
Fisherman's Wife was written by Ewan McColl to a traditional tune, as part of the "Singing the Fishing" Radio Ballads.
Allie Windwick from Orkney wrote several songs about the sea.
"Braw Sailing on the Sea" (not sure how old this is)

And just 2 days old this song, following a visit to Australia's Great Ocean Road I have written a song called "the Wreck of The Loch Ard". Add me to the female composers!
Will post lyrics later.

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 24 Nov 12 - 09:38 PM

Oops, mea culpa, humble apologies. It WAS Matt Armour who wrote Shores of the Forth, although it is the title track of the album by John Watt and Davey Stewart! But John Watt was a prolific songwriter himself, and ( I'm pretty sure!) wrote a song about The Eyemouth disaster and Farewell to the Ferries (after the Forth Road Bridge was opened.)

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: Alaska Mike
Date: 25 Nov 12 - 08:12 AM

I've written a number of nautical songs that people have enjoyed over the years. "Clippership", "First Kill", "Halibut", "Johnny Come and Do", "Little Jim", "Salmon Love", "Sailor's Lament", "Shenandoah Roll On Home", "Tiny Bit Of Heaven", "When Your Ship Comes In", and "Whiskey John". Traditional and contemporary nautical songs have always been a part of my set lists and I enjoy singing low harmonies whenever a chantey or forebitter rises in the circle.

Subject: Lyr Add: THE SONG OF EÄRENDIL (Tolkien)
From: MorwenEdhelwen1
Date: 28 Apr 13 - 12:19 AM

The following is originally a poem about Eärendil, a mariner in Tolkien's works who eventually became the "evening star", the planet Venus. The text is from The Fellowship Of The Ring It's been set to music by the Tolkien Ensemble.

Eärendil was a mariner
That tarried in Arvenien,
He built a boat of timber felled
In Nimbrethil to journey in.

Her sails he wove of silver fair,
Of silver were her lanterns made,
Her prow was fashioned like a swan,
and lights upon her banners laid.

In panoply of ancient kings,
In chainéd rings he armoured him;
his shining shield was scored with runes
to ward all wounds and harm from him;
his bow was made of dragon-horn,
his arrows shorn of ebony;
of silver was his habergeon,
his scabbard of chalcedony;
his sword of steel was valiant,
of adamant his helmet tall,
an eagle-plume upon his crest,
upon his breast an emerald.

Beneath the Moon and under star
he wandered far from northern strands,
bewildered on enchanted ways
beyond the days of mortal lands.
From gnashing of the Narrow Ice
where shadow lies on frozen hills,
from nether heats and burning waste
he turned in haste, and roving still
on starless waters far astray
at last he came to Night of Naught,
and passed, and never sight he saw
of shining shore nor light he sought.
The winds of wrath came driving him,
and blindly in the foam he fled
from west to east and errandless,
unheralded he homeward sped.

There flying Elwing came to him,
and flame was in the darkness lit;
more bright than light of diamond
the fire on her carcanet.
The Silmaril she bound on him
and crowned him with the living light
and dauntless then with burning brow
he turned his prow; and in the night
from Otherworld beyond the Sea
there strong and free a storm arose,
a wind of power in Tarmenel;
by paths that seldom mortal goes
his boat it bore with biting breath
as might of death across the grey
and long forsaken seas distressed;
from east to west he passed away.

Through Evernight he back was borne
on black and roaring waves that ran
o'er leagues unlit and foundered shores
that drowned before the Days began,
until he heard on strands of pearl
where ends the world the music long,
where ever-foaming billows roll
the yellow gold and jewels wan.
He saw the Mountain silent rise
where twilight lies upon the knees
of Valinor, and Eldamar
beheld afar beyond the seas.
A wanderer escaped from night
to haven white he came at last,
to Elvenhome the green and fair
where keen the air, where pale as glass
beneath the Hill of Ilmarin
a-glimmer in a valley sheer
the lamplit towers of Tirion
are mirrored on the Shadowmere.

He tarried there from errantry,
and melodies they taught to him,
and sages old him marvels told,
and harps of gold they brought to him.
They clothed him then in elven-white,
and seven lights before him sent,
as through the Calacirian
to hidden land forlorn he went.
He came unto the timeless halls
where shining fall the countless years,
and endless reigns the Elder King
in Ilmarin on Mountain sheer;
and words unheard were spoken then
of folk and Men and Elven-kin,
beyond the world were visions showed
forbid to those that dwell therein.

A ship then new they built for him
of mithril and of elven-glass
with shining prow; no shaven oar
nor sail she bore on silver mast:
the Silmaril as lantern light
and banner bright with living flame
to gleam thereon by Elbereth
herself was set, who thither came
and wings immortal made for him,
and laid on him undying doom,
to sail the shoreless skies and come
behind the Sun and light of Moon.

From Evereven's lofty hills
where softly silver fountains fall
his wings him bore, a wandering light,
beyond the mighty Mountain Wall.
From a World's End there he turned away,
and yearned again to find afar
his home through shadows journeying,
and burning as an island star
on high above the mists he came,
a distant flame before the Sun,
a wonder ere the waking dawn
where grey the Norland waters run.

And over Middle-earth he passed
and heard at last the weeping sore
of women and of elven-maids
in Elder Days, in years of yore.
But on him mighty doom was laid,
till Moon should fade, an orbéd star
to pass, and tarry never more
on Hither Shores where Mortals are;
for ever still a herald on
an errand that should never rest
to bear his shining lamp afar,
the Flammifer of Westernesse.

Song Of Eärendil on Tolkien Gateway

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: May Queen
Date: 30 Apr 13 - 05:01 PM

Dont think anyone has mentioned The Corncrake by Ian 'Nobby'Dye. It references my home town of Bristol and has been taken up by the Fishermen's Friends...lovely song.Written in the 70's I believe.

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: GUEST,eldergirl
Date: 22 Jul 13 - 04:55 AM

Helen North's 'Midshipman's Boast'. Hamish Currie has recorded his own arrangement of this but no one else has yet, as far as I know.

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: Old Grey Wolf
Date: 22 Jul 13 - 08:31 AM

Ode to Big Blue by Gordon Lightfoot.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_63sELEmWlU

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 22 Jul 13 - 07:01 PM

To me the term new shanty is a bit of a contradiction - a shanty, ie a song made for a job of work must have by definition a cut-off up to the point when sailing vessels were used for commercial shipping as opposed to sail training. Anything after this can only be a sea song written in the idiom of a working song. Even in the days of cpommercial sailing vessels there were contempory songs gthat were used for work, particulalry pumping songs.

Probably a subject for another thread - the boundary between popular songs being used at sea, and popular songs being parodied/sailorised sufficiently to be classed as a bona-fide shanty.

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: Sailor Ron
Date: 23 Jul 13 - 05:40 AM

"popular songs being parodied....." this of course continued up to [at least] the 1970s, see the Merchant Navy Perma. thread.

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 24 Jul 13 - 12:25 PM

Here's the song I wrote back last November, which I promised to post. Wrote my own tune to it, but haven't yet recorded it. Most of the background research was thanks to the Australian Government website, but I did find myself looking up "Shipping Times" and such-like!
I was drawn to the story, by the name of the ship, The Loch Ard, and found that she and many other "Loch Line" ships had been built on the Clyde in Scotland: the were the last of the sailing ships that still took the "long way round" to Australia even after the Suez canal had been opened.

THE LOCH ARD SHIPWRECK                           
Aka Ballad of Tom and Eva                        

She was built on the Clyde in 1873
A three-masted iron-hulled clipper was she,
Loch Ard she was named, of the famous Loch Line,
And she sailed for Melbourne with a cargo fine.
For four years more she would ply up and down
Carrying all the things they wanted in Melbourne town,
With hats, clocks, pianos, perfumes, linen, candles, spades
And sleepers for the railways that were then being laid.

Chorus
She sailed away, she sailed away,
Heading for Australia on a warm sunny day,
But what would be her fate, there were none could say,
As she ploughed the Southern Ocean.

Then in March '78 she sailed away again
With 37 passengers and 17 crewmen,
The passage was smooth till they reached the southern seas
By Victoria's Port Campbell all was suddenly unease.
On the first day of June at the early hour of three
Loch Ard's Captain Gibbs no landmarks could he see,
Trapped in swirling fog, Otway lighthouse was not found,
And by Mutton Bird Island, the ship must surely ground.

Chorus

But when the fog lifted, the awful truth did dawn,
Those towering cliffs, far too close in early morn,
The Captain turned her round, and tried to steer away,
But her sails would not fill, she was stuck there in the bay.
He tried to drop the anchor, but in sand it would not hold,
The ship's bow pulled round, and her fate would soon be told,
Despite his desperate efforts there could be no relief,
Loch Ard's death knell pealed as she smashed up on a reef.

Chorus

The top deck parted from the hull, the masts crashed down as well,
One lifeboat was launched but capsized in the swell,
The waves swept o'er the ship, screaming people in the foam,
And those who stayed below the decks would soon be "going home".
But young Eva Carmichael was clinging to a beam,
After 5 hours in the water, she should die it would seem,
But Tom Pearce came to the rescue, when Eva he did save,
Revived with brandy from the wreck, they sheltered in a cave.

Chorus

When Tom went for help, the cliffs he had to scale,
He followed horses' footprints along a muddy trail,
Tom and Eva, sole survivors, you might think there'd be romance,
But Eva soon was homeward bound to Ireland, not a chance.
While Tom stayed in Australia, a hero he was made,
A tune was written for him although now so seldom played.
A medal for his bravery and money was donated,
He was the talk of Melbourne Town, by one and all was feted.

Chorus

In salvaging from the wreck, much treasure was there was found,
A precious Minton peacock to the museum would be bound.
But after you have been there, you still should go and view
Those deadly cliffs that claimed so many lives, spared so few.
More than 50 ships foundered upon this treacherous coast,
The Loch Line out of 25 may have lost the most,
The inlet where young Tom and Eva stumbled back on shore
Is named the Loch Ard Gorge, and will be so evermore.

Chorus
She sailed away, she sailed away,
Heading for Australia on a warm sunny day,
But what would be her fate, you now have heard me say,
As she ploughed the Southern Ocean.

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: sciencegeek
Date: 25 Jul 13 - 06:26 PM

For He Who Was Lost

And the sea is kind and the sea is cruel,
The sea is as the sea will be,
But if the sea is cruel or kind,
It means nothing to the sea ,

The wind was blowing a force six gale,
As the waves swept down the starboard side,
And they knocked me to the slickened deck,
And took me on a watery ride.

And I thrashed for fifty feet or more,
Between the cabin and the rails,
Till it threw me to a bottom line,
And to hold on fast I did prevail.

And I walked the lifeline hand o'hand,
As the ship, it fell and rose,
Till I reached the hatch behind the break,
Went below to eat and dry my clothes.

And the sea is kind and the sea is cruel,
The sea is as the sea will be,
But if the sea is cruel or kind,
It means nothing to the sea.


The kid was on the port side forward,
To lash down and stow the gear,
As the bow went down the wave came o'r,
And cast him out into the sea.

The lookout cried and gave alarm,
Loud and long did cry he,
As the ship on its heels like a stallion turned,
And came about into the sea.

And the swell crests glistened in the sun,
And the troughs were dark, as dark could be,
Twenty-five feet we rose and fell,
As we pitched and rolled in a beaming sea.

A plane was from Bermuda sent,
Its engines droned in the evening's gray,
As the night came in with its darkening shroud,
We resumed our course and went on our way.

And the sea is kind and the sea is cruel,
The sea is as the sea will be,
But if the sea is cruel or kind,
It means nothing to the sea.

A collection, it was taken up,
To send back to his family,
But thirty-four dollars was all t'was got,
For the boy lost out in the sea.

And the sea is kind and the sea is cruel,
The sea is as the sea will be,
But if the sea is cruel or kind,
It means nothing to the sea.

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: sciencegeek
Date: 25 Jul 13 - 06:29 PM

sorry... lost the explanation for his song

It took 4 decades, but this was written by Mike about a young sailor lost overboard off their destroyer back in the late 1960's. Things like that don't leave you.

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: Lonesome EJ
Date: 25 Jul 13 - 09:07 PM

Song I wrote on the loss of the tall ship Bounty during the great hurricane...
Bounty, Sail Away

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: sciencegeek
Date: 26 Jul 13 - 11:05 AM

"To me the term new shanty is a bit of a contradiction - a shanty, ie a song made for a job of work must have by definition a cut-off up to the point when sailing vessels were used for commercial shipping as opposed to sail training. Anything after this can only be a sea song written in the idiom of a working song. Even in the days of cpommercial sailing vessels there were contempory songs gthat were used for work, particulalry pumping songs.

Probably a subject for another thread - the boundary between popular songs being used at sea, and popular songs being parodied/sailorised sufficiently to be classed as a bona-fide shanty."

My feelings are that shanties served a purpose... a work shanty had a meter that served the job at hand.. and a foc's'le shanty served to while away time for the crew. Once the jobs/work changed at sea with new technology, traditional shanties should have died out... and almost did.

BUT... songs that were once restricted to shipboard and maybe sailortown because they were too rough, vulgar and common for landman's society still lived on with those who sang them .. and listened to them.

An often overlooked feature of shanties is that they were singable... very singable. They had to be to do the job of bringing things together in unison. Tunes & lyrics were taken from many sources and fashioned together for a new purpose onbaord ship - and that practice seems to have gone on after the age of sail and moved to the land as well.

A waltz can be played and danced to in a grand ballroom... or in a living room. Or just played for the enjoyment of listeners. New waltzes are being written today, though very rarely danced to. Does this make them less a waltz?

Perhaps we should refer to some as traditional - meaning they were originally used during a defined period- and others as contemporary or whatever for those that have the correct meter & "feel" of a shanty and could be used for the original purpose if needed. I see shanties still serving a purpose... just one rather different than that originally needed.

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: GUEST,Daniel
Date: 26 Jul 13 - 12:03 PM

Not everyone's cup of tea, of course, but I've always thought that Steve Knightley's 'I'll Haunt You' is an interesting song. And Seth Lakeman's 'Solomon Brown' about the Pennlee lifeboat disaster is a good one.

And if we're talking about Stan Rogers, his Flowers of Bermuda is such a good song. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YVUei-0WYC4

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: GUEST,celtaddict
Date: 03 Aug 19 - 04:19 PM

Hi, all, I find a couple of references to a Birkenhead Drill, and am familiar with the meaning (the women and children first practice) and the Kipling poem Soldiers and Sailors Too, but I have not found the song itself. Can anyone help me out?

Also, it gladdens my heart to see how many on this (older) thread are people I now know in the flesh!

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: Bruce D
Date: 05 Aug 19 - 08:37 AM

Cyril Tawney and Stan Rogers, are proberly the two best of writers of Nautical songs in recent decades. I've found that Tom Lewis while he has writern lots of songs,isn't to the same standard of Cyril and Stan.


Bruce D

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: Charley Noble
Date: 06 Aug 19 - 04:58 PM

Celtaddict-

I guess I'll have to transcribe Ken Stephen's "Birkenhead Drill" myself. I can't seem to find it anywhere. I have a hand-written copy from Ken that he gave me in 1991 which I treasure.

Charlie Ipcar

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: GUEST,henryp
Date: 06 Aug 19 - 05:17 PM

Nights Like This, written by Jim Hancock of Scunthorpe, North Lincolnshire.
Recorded by Clarty Sough - Jim Hancock and Geoff Convery.

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: GUEST,Dean Calin
Date: 22 Sep 19 - 01:11 AM

Gina Dalby and Christy Dalby from Bounding Main together wrote "Pass the Mug." Gina wrote and excellent piece, "Roll Call," that honors the many lost ships of the Great Lakes.

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 22 Sep 19 - 06:21 AM

BEST ONE I'VE HEARD TO DATE
The authentic use of the interview with Ben Bright lifts it above all the others, in my opinion
Phil Colclough wrote a good song entitled 'Leaving of London' based on his experiences as a merchant seaman
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: GUEST,Julia L
Date: 22 Sep 19 - 07:21 AM

CAPPY JOHN'S BRIDE ©1996 Fred Gosbee BMI Castlebay Music

Now a skipper that we know who was famous long ago
Was looking for a ship as his was run aground
Though it was sometimes stated 'twas the way he navigated
Ol' Cappy John was rated as the finest man around

Now there was a ship nearby that he wanted for to try
It belonged to Ned McKenzie and was called the Mary Beale
But old John was shy of girls and the place was full of curls
And he didn't have the nerve to go up and make his deal

She carries her bow high and her stern is nice and round
It's easy to hold her when she's sheeted down
She is my heart's desire and all that I require
Is that you let me try her when I come to town

Now the mate, whose name was Dan,
Up and says to the old man
“I can sound McKenzie out and then clear away the girls
I will see that it's alright if you want to go tonight
For that ship she is a sight, she's the best in all the world”

So Dan goes to McKenzie but somehow in all the frenzy
There was some misunderstanding
And he got the message wrong
Or perhaps the silly goomer had a twisted sense of humor
But when Cappy came to view her he was singing this song

McKenzie shook his hand and he says “I understand
that you want to take my Mary away from me
Now before with you I send her I must tell you she is tender
Which I'll thank you to remember when you take her out to sea”

So John says “Dan must have told that I want to fill her hold;
With a belly full of cargo I know she'll handle fine
I promise not to break her and if ever I forsake her ,
Then I know the mate will take her for he's a friend of mine”

Says McKenzie “Are you mad? for you talk just like a cad
To throw my Mary over like some trollop in Rangoon
She isn't just some fun thing (though I might permit some bundling)
But I will tell you one thing, you must make your offer soon”

Says John “I can't commit , until one thing you permit      
You must let me roll her over on the sand beside the bay
I will have my men inspect her and still I may reject her
If her bottom is neglected or has started to decay”

Says McKenzie “I can't stand it ; you are worse than any bandit
Since the two of you have planned it
‘tis yourselves that should begin”
He called Mary from the kitchen :Cappy John he started twitchin'
But the girl she was bewitchin' and she smiled as she came in

Now the mate, he oiled the water,
And the skipper got the daughter
He's as happy as an otter with his dear and blushing bride
Though it seemed a bright invention
He'd the good sense not to mention
That it wasn't his intention,
AND HE GOT THE SHIP BESIDES!

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Jan 21 - 11:16 AM

Rudy Sunde wrote many a great sea song, other than Auckland to the Bluff.
I've bern looking for the lyrics to The Ocean Queen, without any luck so far. I've cobbled most of them together by the stop n go method of listening to them and then writing them down. Does anybody here have them?

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 25 Jan 21 - 07:35 PM

Guest, you might do better putting your request up as a new thread, Lyric Request. Also why not join Mudcat as a non-guest?

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: GUEST,henryp
Date: 26 Jan 21 - 06:54 AM

The Pole Star / To the tune of The Man in the Moon

I'll sing you a story, a song of the sea, I'll tell it just like the man told it to me
Though some may deny it, the odd one or two, I swear, cross my heart, that the story is true

Pole Star was laid down on the banks of the Clyde. At her launch, the men cheered as they looked on in pride
A barque with four masts and a hull built for speed, Captain Black looked up at her, a proud man indeed

Chorus; Captain Black was the master, the man in command
Of the Pole Star. He cried, I'm the luckiest man!

A crowd lined the quay as Pole Star sailed away, For Melbourne, the port sailors call Hobson's Bay
Next on to Calcutta to load jute and then, Pole Star turned towards London to sail home again

She rounded the Cape on a wild stormy day And then a huge wave washed the captain away
Even he was surprised when the next wave proved kind Dumping him on the deck of the tall ship behind

Chorus        

He said, I've dropped in from the ship called Pole Star. Are you bound for London? They said, Yes, we are
And sixty days later he stepped ashore there But he couldn't see Pole Star tied up anywhere

He stood on the quayside as Pole Star arrived. It must be the ghost of the captain! they cried
He's come back to haunt us from sea and from foam. No, it's me, laughed the captain, I simply swam home!

Chorus

This is, I believe, an exaggerated account of the maiden voyage of the Loch Torridon in 1882.

http://www.thelochlong.info/Loch_Torridon.htm The first master of the Loch Torridon was Captain Pinder. She loaded a heavy cargo for Melbourne, arriving at Hobson's Bay 105 days out, which did not give a good indication of her sailing capabilities. She then went to Calcutta with a cargo of horses. On August 22nd, 1882, she left Calcutta with a cargo of jute. All went well until off the Cape, were Captain Pinder made a mistake while sailing in a heavy W.N.W. gale. Although the mate begged the Captain not to set the foresail before he put his helm up, Captain Pinder was determined to risk it, having got away with it once before. When he tried the wear the ship around to the starboard tack she got off before the wind and there was not enough way on her. As a result, a tremendous sea broke over her poop and carried Captain Pinder, the 2nd mate, man at the wheel, sailmaker, and a boy overboard. The mate was also swept away, but was saved when a turn of the main-brace held him by the leg. The men overboard could not be rescued in such a sea and were never seen again, the mate bringing the ship home.

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: GUEST,henryp
Date: 27 Jan 21 - 01:09 PM

The Sailor's Stone stands beside the old Portsmouth Road climbing over Hindhead in the Surrey Hills, now landscaped following the construction of Hindhead Tunnel. It bears the inscription;

ERECTED
In detestation of a barbarous Murder
Committed here on an unknown Sailor
On Sep, 24th 1786
By Edwd. Lonegon, Mich. Casey & Jas. Marshall
Who were all taken the same day
And hung in Chains near this place
Whoso sheddeth Man's Blood
by Man shall his Blood be shed.

The Unknown Sailor
sung to the tune of 'The Calico Printer's Clerk' written by Dave Moran of The Halliard
after The Halliard (Dave Moran, Nic Jones and Nigel Paterson) discovered the song in the Harkness Collection of broadsides in the Harris Library, Preston.

From his home in London
An Able Seaman strode
Back to his ship he made his trip
Upon the Portsmouth Road
At the village inn in Thursley
He stopped to buy a round
And there three men he did befriend
They too were Portsmouth bound

Chorus; As you travel on life's journey
             You'll meet your fellow man
             But take great care for while you share
             Others take what they can

On the lonely climb up Hindhead
Those men made their attack
And with a knife they took his life
And made off with his pack
Now those cut-throats hang in irons
On the top of Gibbet Hill
To show us all what will befall
Those who treat others ill

Chorus

A stone stands by the wayside
To mark where he was killed
All travellers know no grass will grow
Where that red blood was spilled
In quiet Thursley churchyard
The unknown sailor sleeps
His kin still yearn for his return
From sailing on the deep

Chorus

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: GUEST,henryp
Date: 27 Jan 21 - 02:44 PM

New song Pole Star - see two posts earlier.

On second thoughts, this should go to the tune of The Creggan White Hare.

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: GeoffLawes
Date: 28 Jan 21 - 09:39 AM

Many posts above mention Linda Kelly's The luckiest Sailor and you can listen to it on the Yorkshire Garland site here:
http://www.yorkshirefolksong.net/song.cfm?songID=92

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: GUEST,henryp
Date: 29 Jan 21 - 07:18 PM

THE RISE OF THE SHANTIES – NEW BOOK 'SAILOR SONG' Review by Alex Gallacher 21 January, 2021 folkradio

The British Library has announced the publication of Sailor Song – The Shanties and Ballads of the High Seas by Gerry Smyth, a Professor of Irish Cultural History of Liverpool John Moores University. Originally planned for publication in April, the publication date has been brought forward to today.

Prof Gerry Smyth; I was born and grew up in Dublin. After working in Spain for five years as a professional musician, I moved to Liverpool in 1986 where I took a degree in 'Literature, Life and Thought' at the Polytechnic, before going on to do an MA in Cultural Studies at the University of Lancaster, and a PhD at the University of Stafford.

I combine my academic and pedagogic interests with various musical and theatrical activities. I have research interests in Irish literary history, James Joyce, modernism, music and literature, posthumanism and ecocriticism, and would welcome inquiries for doctoral research in any of these areas.

Wikipedia; Under the name Gerry McGowan, Smyth has released a number of albums of progressive folk music: The Colour Tree (2003), riverrun (2005), and The Usual Story (2008). He has also recorded and released three albums of Liverpool-related shanties: Roll & Go: Songs of Liverpool and the Sea (2009); Across the Western Ocean (2011) - this being a compilation of songs by various musicians from Merseyside performing shanties and ballads associated with Liverpool in aid of the Royal National Lifeboat Institute station in Hoylake, Merseyside; and Sailor Song (2017), with Wallasey-based folk group Reckless Elbow.

He now runs the LJMU shanty choir, Anti-Shanty, who have performed at the Liverpool River Festival and at the Launch of the LJMU Institute for Literacy and Cultural History at Tate Liverpool on the city's Albert Dock.
Smyth has since been commissioned by the British Library to write a book on the shanty entitled Sailor Song, due for publication under the library's commercial imprint in 2020.

Subject: RE: 'New' Sea Songs & Shanties & Nautical Songs
From: Black belt caterpillar wrestler
Date: 30 Jan 21 - 03:47 AM

Another vote for Andrew's "Dead reckoning".

Also has nobody mentioned "Icy acres"?

Robin