Sea Chanties and MCE’s Celebrate America

Sea chanties (aka shanties)—Sailors’ work songs which accompanied various chores aboard the ship—and a sailor’s life on the great sailing ships; nothing like them to set the imagination adrift. Here is a common description of the role of sea shanties on board a sailing ship, “A sea shanty is a working song sung by sailors while performing repetitive tasks upon a ship. The rhythms of the songs coincided with the sailors’ movements as they worked, helping to relieve the burden of hard physical labor and relieve boredom.”

How do sea chanties fit into Master Chorus Eastside’s All-American Independence Celebration on June 24?  They are a part of the Melting Pot immigrant influences that have shaped American music, and Linda Gingrich, artistic director of MCE,  has created a haunting arrangement of the traditional sea chantey, “Haul Away, Joe”  which struck fire to my musical imagination in at least three places.

In one of the early rehearsals, as we were singing the refrain, “Haul away, Joe”, the voices of all hands were aligned and we all hit the down beat at exactly the same instant. And I was electrified because just at that instant I understood the power that could be generated by the unison of voice, muscle, rhythm and melody as the seamen hauled together with almost superhuman strength and endurance.

In the middle section, while the tenors are hauling away in their he-manly fashion, they are accompanied by wisps of women’s voices which whisper in falling sighs “Ahh-ohh, ahh-ohh, ahh-ohh...”  These voices seem to express fragments of a mild lament--like that of a small, disappointing wind. It started me wondering if sailors had a sense of the poetry of the water and wind that surrounded them. Is it possible that they might identify the sounds of contrary, complaining, sad little winds with the women in their lives?

Later in the song, there is a historical reference which captivates me.  One of the traditional verses in this shanty speaks of the historically unfortunate Louis XVI of France. One version is sung,

“King Louis was the king of France before the Revolution,

But then he got his head cut off which spoiled his constitution…”

How did this verse about the French king show up in a sailor’s work song? It immediately seemed very clear to me that this was not an item of historical interest in the context of this song, but was topical-- fresh news of the day—current events. It seems to me that sailors in the days of the great sailing ships (16^th century to the middle of the 19^th century) must have been a relatively cosmopolitan group when compared with their land-loving peers, and that they would pick up bits of international gossip as they went from port to port. I wonder how American and British sailors would have understood this unheard of event—the beheading of a king with a democratically leveling instrument of execution. It seems to have made an impression on them. Although King Louis is the subject of a humorous play on words in this verse, the sailors of my imagination have just a bit of sympathy for the poor old fellow.

Roberta DeBruler

MCE Musical Correspondent