Sea shanties and maritime music

A chanty is a seaman's work song, and the Chanty Man is its leader – the acknowledged foresinger, forehand of the working crew. Black and blue from the thuggery of Shanghai Brown's boarding-house – or Patch Eye Curtin's, or Katie Wilson's; split-lipped, broken-nosed, ear-slit, scalp-torn; cheated and shown by cozen and crimp; sick of soul and body; his chief earthly possessions a port, pannikin, and spoon, and a pair of leaky sea-boots...

And still he could sing! Blessed was the ship that could boast one good man of his tribe. Thrice blessed she that could boast one in each watch.

William Brown Meloney IV, Everybody's Magazine, 1915

This Day in History (February 29, 1908)

This Day in History (January 8, 1806)

The death of Lord Nelson was a national tragedy like no other for England. "From Greenwich to Whitehall Stairs, on the 8th of January, 1806, in one of the greatest Aquatic Processions that ever was beheld on the River Thames" drifted the royal shallop (barge). The event is referenced in the modern lament, Carrying Nelson Home. Nelson is mentioned in nearly a dozen other songs.

Try a random shanty sampling