The a Cappella Sea Shanty Playlist
If you are active on TikTok or social media in general, you may have noticed a noticeable increase in rhythmic chanting in your feeds lately. Young children seem to have adopted a new hobby and these are intricate remixes of old sea shacks. The trend has been picking up steam since the summer , according to KnowYourMeme, and it took to Twitter a few weeks ago when clips for various and increasingly complex versions of “Wellerman” went viral. (If you need even more proof that this isn’t just a one-off incident , here’s a fun thread from other recent meme examples .) However, we at Lifehacker were way ahead of the TikTok trend: we first published a sea of Shanti explainer / replay below back in 2018. “chanteys of the sea are work songs, so they are designed to coordinate efforts between a group of people doing manual labor, ”says video producer Jamison Hermann , who sang them while working on ships at the Mystic Maritime Museum of the seaport . “In maritime history circles, it is said that a good fisherman is worth ten sailors on a rope,” because he helps everyone pull the rope at once. Hermann has included over 60 marine songs – purely a cappella – on the Spotify Music for Seaports collaborative playlist. This is classical music for productive work, suitable for physical work. And for those of us at the desk, this is great morning entertainment.
Hermann inherited his love of boating and marine music from his uncle Craig Edwards, folk musician, teacher and former director of the Mystic Seaport Marine Music Festival . Speaking about the Catapult festival, Blair Thornburgh explains :
Shanties were wholesome songs, evolving from the wild, screaming screams of workers on decks to melodies and choruses, polished and honed to be lifted or dragged – never frivolous, but necessary.
The hut (sometimes spelled chantey or chanty, all derived from the French chantez meaning “to sing”) is rough, rough music, a step forward from chanting. But if you search for recorded shacks, you’ll find many sleek tracks from contemporary folk singers, piled high with instruments and studio engineering. Even Stan Rogers, a folk singer with a superb a cappella version of Barrett’s Privateers, cluttered most of his recordings with mandolin, guitar, bass, violin, drum kit and even piano. It is difficult to feel like you are pulling the rope and hoisting the sail when the whole group is joining you.
Fortunately, most folk artists record at least a few songs and sometimes entire a cappella albums. Hermann chose only vocal compositions for his playlist, borrowing in some places from several albums, including “Sea Songs and Chanteys” by Rick Spencer, in which Uncle Craig plays backing vocals. I added a couple of tracks, including “Randy Dandy Oh” from the amazingly clear soundtrack for Assassin’s Creed 4: Black Flag . After listening, add your own a cappella shacks. You too can be worth ten sailors per line.
Music for seaports | Jamison Hermann on Spotify This article was originally published in September 2018 and updated on January 12, 2021 with updated context.