February 18, 2021 • 25 mins
Sea shantys weren’t just a way to pass the time on a ship, they were integral to the running of it by keeping the men working like clockwork. TikTok TikTok. James Revell Carr joins brings Matt and Helen on this expedition into the harmonic world of Sea Shanty Singers.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is job Slete. I'm Helen Houng and I'm at beat,
and today we're talking about sea shanty singers. Well, let's
shanty into it, shall we. Oh help me bob bum
Bully in the alley, way, Bully in the alley. Help
me bob bum Bully in the alley, pullay down engin Bona.
(00:22):
Now Sally is a girl in shin Bone Holly way,
he bully in the holley. Sally is a girl in
shin Bone Holly Bully down inchin Bona. Oh help me,
bobam bully in the holly ware. Believe the holly. Help
me bobam bully in the holly bullied on inchin Bona.
(00:45):
I for myself out under three we're blieme the Holly.
I for myself with time so free, pulay down engin Bona.
Oh help me bob bum Bully in the holley way
Bully so catchy. But I almost didn't know any of
(01:10):
the words that they were saying. Yeah, well it's called
bully in the alley and that was ethel verra Omen
and Sam Pope by the way, But that's a traditional
sea shanty and bully really just means like drunk or
maybe aggressive, and they're they're talking oh like an actual
like an actual bully. Yeah uh, but also alley. The
(01:35):
alley specifically they may be referring to is shin Bone Alley,
which is in St. George Bermuda, which was known as
a kind of a rowdy street with a bunch of taverns. Wow,
and here I thought it would had some like deep
layered meaning, but it's actually literally like a bully in
(01:56):
an alley and singing about how great are well? I
love I love the trend and I love the song.
But why are we talking about this on our podcast, Matt,
Because this was an actual job. Being a c shanty
singer was an actual job. What Yeah, so we're gonna
ride this trend. Let's just take advantage. Oh my god, guys,
(02:19):
there's there's a very tiny then diagram of job sleete
topics and current trends, and I think it's just this topic.
What an opportunity to educate the folks by tricking them
with this trend. So you know that song soon may
the Wellerman come? That's the big Yeah, that's the big
one started this a yeah, right? That actually is not
(02:42):
a shanty? What we we're dropping some real knowledge here
on job sleep. Wait, but that's the that's the song
that started the whole trend. Yeah, I'm just kind of
being like one of those like snobs right now. It's
technically not a C shanty because it's not a work song.
A C shanty is is a work song. So what's
(03:05):
the actual definition of a C shanty. Well, it's a
type of traditional folk song that was commonly sung as
a work song, specifically for these sailors on these big
sailing merchant sailing vessels. We spoke to someone who has
been quite busy lately because of this CE shanty trend.
(03:28):
Dr revel Car. Hi, I'm Dr Revel car I'm an
associate professor of ethno musicology and the director of the
John Jacob Niles Center for American Music at the University
of Kentucky. And I do have a book that is
largely about sailor songs and sea shanties. And my book
(03:48):
is called Hawaiian Music in Motion and the subtitle is
Mariners Missionaries? Are We Mariners? Minstrels and Missionary's. Even he
doesn't know the name of his own book, he is
so qualified for this episode that he he loses track
of all his qualifications. He literally he literally wrote the book.
(04:12):
He can't remember the name of the book, but he
literally wrote the book. And I feel so bad for
him because, you know, right now with this trend, like
everybody's bugging him. But he he spent some time with us.
Not only that, but he sang a sea shanty with
us on TikTok, which we will we will preview that
at the end of the show. So anyway, Yeah, a
shanty is a work song. A shanty is a work
(04:35):
song that was typically sung aboard a sailing ship during
the nineteenth century, and these were deep water sailing ships
where shanties were typically sung. Not so much aboard coastal
schooners or fishing boats and things like that, but deep
water sailing ships that traveled across the ocean's intercontinental shipping
(04:57):
primarily packet ships which carried argo, or whaling ships that
were kind of slow, slow ships that traveled all over
the world hunting for whales. As for the word shanty,
I think there's not a lot of agreement on where
it comes from. I think my best theory is that
it comes from the word to chant, or the French chanterre,
(05:21):
so just that it's derivative of chanting. Ah chanterre. I
can see how chanterre becomes shanty. Now another thing about
these these merchant ships and these sea shanties on these ships,
it wasn't just one group of people. When we think
of CEA shanties, most of them are old guys, well
(05:44):
specifically Anglo Saxon. Yeah. Like, but actually you see evidence
of shanty men all over the world, Pacific Ocean, Atlantic Ocean,
all kinds of different countries, different ethnic groups. It's a
it's a worldwide phenomenon. So it really evolved through African
American sailors. The best guess as to how shanties evolved,
(06:07):
I think right now is that it did come from
African American workers, primarily in southern ports and of course
sailing ships in the nineteenth century. American ships in particular
often had African Americans on the crew, and I think
maybe people are not fully aware of this, but particularly
aboard whaling ships, African American crewmen were a pretty common thing.
(06:31):
Many of the whaling ships that came out of places
like Nantucket were owned and operated by Quakers, and the
Quakers were heavily involved in the abolitionist movement. Wow, so
they weren't enslaved African Americans. They were free men who
were well, I guess if it's the late eight hundreds,
it was after the Civil War, so they were free. Yeah,
(06:53):
but even before the Civil War, the Quaker whaling ships
had African Americans who were free. But yes, the South,
especially in the Caribbean, of course, there were many men
working these ships who were shantymen who also happened to
be enslaved. So what we find is like this is
something that is actually quite multicultural. Yeah, I'm actually really
(07:16):
surprised to learn that the evolution of the shanty came
from African American sailors because when you see the most
of the clips on TikTok, it seems like it's it's
like an Irish thing or Scottish thing from back in
the day. So like, how did those two groups interact
for this to evolve. It's just a matter of practicality.
For like, if you had a merchant ship, you needed
(07:38):
workers wherever you could get them, and so they a
lot of times they didn't care where you came from.
And so this it's it's really cool. Actually the diversity
on these ships. It's pretty amazing. Frank Bullen, who wrote
a great book called Songs of Sea Labor that I
think came out around nineteen eleven. They all described African
(07:58):
American sailors as the best shanty singers and that if
you had a black singer on board, that was that
was who you you would want leading your shanties. You know.
The music was really coming from a black tradition and
then became appropriated and expanded upon by Irisian, Scots and others.
It's especially aboard whaling ships that these ships were multicultural places.
(08:23):
They were among the first multicultural workplaces in American society. Wow,
that is really cool, and that makes sense that if
you're you know, sailing from port to port that it
is very international because the ships are coming from all
over the world and they're congregating in in the various ports,
and it's kind of like the first international city right
(08:45):
where there's like people from all different places coming together.
There were still all kinds of discrimination and marginalized groups,
you know, but once you got on that ship and
you were out out at sea for several months, and
this is a place where people of color could actually
achieve higher ranks and even out rank some of the
Caucasian sailors. So that was kind of a weird thing too.
(09:09):
I'm kind of split listening to that clip about like,
you know, pointing at the black guy on the ship,
ending like that guy should be this chantyman. Because on
the one hand, I understand, like, you know, African American
culture had a lot of musical tradition that you would
want to adopt and sort of you know, draw from.
(09:31):
But if you're pointing at the one black guy and
the ship being like, hey, you must be a good singer,
that's kind of like when I'm the only Asian in
the room and they're like, hey, you must be good
at math, and I'm like, oh no, no, yeah, rude.
If you're looking at me for math, help, That's that's
sort of like a little bit of racism there. But
(09:52):
I understand, like if you want to draw from the tradition,
but just having me like, oh, the black guy obviously
is the best best singer, that's ounds hella racist to me. Helen.
(10:13):
What do you think the if they did actually have
like a job posting for shanty man, what would be
the requirements for skills needed for this job? Definitely keeping
a beat, right, because I feel like that's to me,
it makes sense why the song would even come about,
is like you need you need a good beat like
boom boom, and then you gotta keep a tune. I mean, well, Helen,
(10:36):
you are wrong, really, I know. I was surprised to Okay, yeah,
Like when I was researching this, I was like, hold up,
Like actually, the how they determined who was the shanty
men was who was the best sailor. They were chosen
for their seamanship, not their musical talent, because again, most
of these folks couldn't sing it, it didn't matter. So
(10:59):
the song was is to sort of give direction on
what to do on the boat. So you're like, hey,
grab that or buddy start or ring now like like that.
There were several skills that the shanty men needed to master,
one being their knowledge of the ship and all the
different jobs on the ship, and so shanty singers shanty
(11:22):
men needed to be skilled, able bodied seamen who knew
the ropes literally and knew their way around a ship
because they needed to know all the different jobs, and
then they needed to know which shanties fit with each
specific job, so they would know the difference between hauling
halliard versus working the capstain versus working the pumps, whether
(11:45):
we needed a walk away shanty or a short drag,
all kinds of knowledge of the different jobs. So that
was key, and so they were in many ways among
the most skilled semen aboard the ship. Ah, this makes
so much sense. This is why you would never hire
like Adele or Ariana Grande to be the shanty man
on your phone, because they can sing, like, they can
(12:09):
sing their hearts out, but they don't know anything about sailing.
I mean, there are no shanty women that we know of.
That's another weird thing. That's what we call it shanty
man because it was all men on these ships. Uh, Like,
I'm sure there were exceptions, but that's kind of another thing.
Is like I'm sure some of the singing was actually
quite terrible. Like I that's what I imagined anyway. That's
(12:32):
so interesting. But it's interesting that what he was saying
about having to know all the different roles and having
to know specifically and and sort of leading the actions.
So you're you're the shanty man. You're like, hey, Paul Roger,
you're screwing it up. Pull faster, Yeah, they essentially were
like they were managers, you know, they were they knew
(12:53):
how they were good leaders and so and when we
when we think about the actual songs, it was call
in response and it was like a director directing an orchestra,
like they were. I guess you could compare it somewhat
to an orchestra. You know, it would have been actually
pretty cool though it to witness, like all of them
work together in this way. So it was a tough job.
(13:14):
That's I can't stress it enough, but yeah, Rebel's gonna
explain that specifically, like what these shanty men experienced on
these ships. Life as a seaman aboard any kind of
ship in the nineteenth century was rough. The work was
really hard. You were frequently wet and cold. The food
(13:35):
was bad. So one of the things that chantymen often
did was use their songs as a way to express
the cruise dissatisfaction with the conditions on board the ship.
So they'd sing about weevily biscuits or meat so tough,
it's like leather, and they would come up with ways
(13:56):
to talk about it, and singing about those hardships in
the way was a way around being accused of being complaining,
so you could just say, oh, that was just the song.
We're just singing a song, it's not really So it
was a way for the crew to get their grievances
out without really getting in trouble for it. Now, as
for the conditions of work for the shanty man, and
(14:19):
there might be multiple shanty men on a ship, because
it wasn't always that the crew were all working together.
Crew cruise aboard sailing ships were divided into watches, which
means one group of sailors would work for four hours
and then the port watch would work for the next
four hours, and so you'd go four hours on, four
(14:41):
hours off, all day and all night. But what it
also meant was that they're probably needed to be two
shanty men, one who could work with one watch and
another who could work with another watch. I love the
concept of shanty shift work, like like, hey, shanty man, A,
I'm taking the first shift. You yeah, I got second shift,
(15:02):
And they're like, oh, oh, I gotta get ready for
my shift. La la la la la la la. But
also I love the idea that they used the songs
to complain about the food but not and then and
then be like, no, I wasn't. I wasn't complaining about
the food. It was just a song whatever, Like this
meat sucks so hard, it really sucks so hard. What
(15:25):
are you complaining about the meat? Noah, Man, that was
just a song. Kind of like a comedians will, like,
you know, they'll say things that are too controversial to
say because oh, no, I'm just joying a comedian. I'm
just joking, joking. It's just a stroke, man, it's such
a joke. I was thinking, like when he was saying
that there was multiple shanties going on at once, Like,
at first, I was thinking, like, how would that even
work when that they all be like yelling over each out,
(15:47):
singing over each other. But again, these these ships were
often very big, so I guess that they were spread
out enough. And oh, you could have like a back
portion shanty and a front portion shanty. You're right, it
be hard because because we weren't a lot of the
songs improvised. So it's not like if you had two
shanties they could get on the same page and sing
the same song, because if the song was made up
(16:09):
on the spot, the shanty lyrics were largely improvised. A
real talented shanty man would be able to improvise lyrics
on the spot and make the song basically about whatever
they wanted to beyond the first couple of introductory verses
and the repeating choruses and the repeating refrains, and then
(16:29):
beyond that. Yeah, just I think they needed to know
a lot of songs. They needed to have a good
repertoire of melodies, and they needed to have a voice
that could carry and be tuneful. Wow, that is so cool.
I think we do because of the trend that's happening
now with the Shanties, we assume that all the shanties
were written down because we're following along, you know, especially
(16:53):
if you're duetting with someone on TikTok, they're singing a
very specific song and then you're learning the lines that
they sang and saying along with them. But like the
original Shanties were improvising a lot of the songs and
making them very specific to their their boat situation, which
I think is it's very similar to the way stand
up comics do when they're, you know, at a club,
(17:15):
Like I am a stand up comic and I do
a lot of crowd work, and often that's the most
popular thing that happens in my act is the crowd
work because it's specific to that audience, right, So you
make fun of the guy with the big ten gallon
hat in the fourth row, or you you know, a
waitress drops an entire tray of drinks and you've got
to call that out. So that's that's sort of similar
(17:36):
to my line of work, where you're calling out whatever
is happening in the room at the moment. So, Matt,
what happened to the shanty man? Why did that go away?
(17:57):
By the American Civil War, the anti songs were very
common on pretty much any merchant ship around the world,
Like this was when it was at its peak, i
would say, But then soon we had the steamship that
entered the picture. Shanties declined primarily because of the rise
of steam engines. And it is a little ironic that
(18:20):
shanties developed because of the developing technology that was being
used aboard sailing ships. But it was the continuing development
of those technologies and the addition of steam engines that
ended up bringing about their end. And I'm not just
talking about steam engines that propelled the ship, but also
steam engines that were used aboard the ship. In place
(18:42):
of sailors, a lot of ships carried what was called
a donkey engine, which was a small steam engine that
would be up on the deck of the ship and
that you could use. You could just attach a rope
to the winch on the steam donkey and it would
raise the sail for you, or it would raise the
anchor for you. And so the cruise of the ship's
(19:03):
got smaller, the number of people you needed to run
the ship got fewer and fewer, and so there was
less and less call for actual work songs being sung
the And then I would just maybe also just say
the one place still today that you could be hired
as a shanty man with shanty man in your job
(19:24):
title is Mystic Seaport Museum in Connecticut. Yeah, like with
most things, automation helped to make this job sleep, because,
like he was saying, like on a sailing ship, you
needed to have like thirty people to pull this huge
sale to go up and then pull it back down
when it needs to come down. But if that's all
being automated by steam, then yeah, So the Mystic Seaport
(19:47):
apparently it's the largest maritime museum in the United States
and it has. I didn't even know about this place,
but I want to go so badly after the pandemic's over.
But like, I imagine that this place is going to
be very popular now because of the sea shanty trend.
But Revel kind of sums it up why this trend
(20:08):
has come now. I think that, for one thing, I
think we don't have a lot of opportunities for group
singing in our society today. Singing the national anthem at
a baseball game or a football game that was about
as close as we would get to groups singing, and
even that we're not doing that right now. Church singing
(20:30):
again is another place where people do have that communal
singing experience, But there's not a lot of secular occasions
for groups of people to hear their voices joined together
with other singers. And I think that's one of the
reasons that people love sea shanties. The people who are
really into it love that aspect of getting together with
(20:52):
other people and just singing at the top of their lungs,
just belting it out. Doesn't matter if you can't sing
on he doesn't matter if you don't know all the words.
You'll learn the words get repeated enough that you pick
them up as you go along. It's just fun for people,
and it's a wonderful musical experience for people, even especially
(21:14):
for non musicians, to have that experience of making music
with a group of people and feeling all those voices
joined together. And honestly, that's my favorite thing about the
TikTok chanty thing, is seeing the different combinations of people,
that layering of the vocals. I would point out that
(21:34):
I don't think the Wellerman really took off until this
guy Luke the Voice added his super low base part.
And once you heard that base and the wonderful Scottish
tenor of Nathan Evans together, boy, that just made everyone
want to join in and be part of it. And
so I think there is something really special about singing
(21:57):
in a group, and we we've lost that in our culture,
and shanty singing is a way to bring that back.
I always say there are two things that bring people
of diverse backgrounds together the easiest, and those two things
are sports and music. So bringing the world together during
this turbulent time, thank you see shanties. It doesn't matter
(22:19):
if you have any musical experience or not. This is
for all of us. You know. Yeah, it's so simple.
Even Matt and I can sing a sea shanty. Oh
the make a chunk and he went bellow to take
a swing from his bat to hello, so early in
the board. Ohal's Baalon loves is back to low in
(22:43):
the board, and the same a loves is back to
low irish the board. The ladies love the Lordingiomaccio Lovesio lovesoves.
(23:26):
We make good sailors. Hey, I'm impressed with us, that's
I thought, because I'm not a singer, and I was like,
what I know, but that that was not bad. Well,
we want to hear from you as well. So if
you the listener want to share with us your sea shanty,
(23:47):
we would love to hear it and we will retweet it.
So tweet it at us at job Salete pod. We're
on TikTok as well at job Salete and maybe duet
with us or uh send us a video of you
trying to say ce shanty five times fast. Our expert
today was Rebel car. He's the author of Hawaiian Music
(24:10):
in Motion, Mariners, Missionaries and Minstrels. Thanks to ethel Vera
Ohmen and Sam Pope for graciously allowing us to use
their duet Bully in the Alley. You can find Ethel
on TikTok At Magin dot Bay That's m A j
I n Dot b a E and Sam Is on
TikTok At Sam Pope Music. Check them both out. They've
(24:31):
got great videos on their streams and not just shanties. Hey,
this is really important, but if you like job Slete,
please tell a friend and leave us a review on iTunes.
It's absolutely the best way to help us keep bringing
you these shows. It really does make a difference. Job
Slete is produced for I Heart Radio by Zealots manufacturing
(24:53):
hand Forge Podcast for You. It's hosted by us Helen
Hong That's Me and Matt Beat That's Me. The show
was conceived and produced by Jason Elliott, Steve's Zamarki, and
Anthony Savini. Our editor is Tommy Nichol, Our researcher is
Amelia Paulka, our production coordinator is Angie Hymes, and theme
(25:13):
music is by the mysterious Breakmaster Cylinder. Special thanks to
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Bob Pittman. Hey, did you know? You can find show
notes and more on our Instagram at job selete Pod
This is job Slete. I'm Helen Houng and I'm at beat,
and today we're talking about sea shanty singers. Well, let's
shanty into it, shall we. Oh help me bob bum
Bully in the alley, way, Bully in the alley. Help
me bob bum Bully in the alley, pullay down engin Bona.
(00:22):
Now Sally is a girl in shin Bone Holly way,
he bully in the holley. Sally is a girl in
shin Bone Holly Bully down inchin Bona. Oh help me,
bobam bully in the holly ware. Believe the holly. Help
me bobam bully in the holly bullied on inchin Bona.
(00:45):
I for myself out under three we're blieme the Holly.
I for myself with time so free, pulay down engin Bona.
Oh help me bob bum Bully in the holley way
Bully so catchy. But I almost didn't know any of
(01:10):
the words that they were saying. Yeah, well it's called
bully in the alley and that was ethel verra Omen
and Sam Pope by the way, But that's a traditional
sea shanty and bully really just means like drunk or
maybe aggressive, and they're they're talking oh like an actual
like an actual bully. Yeah uh, but also alley. The
(01:35):
alley specifically they may be referring to is shin Bone Alley,
which is in St. George Bermuda, which was known as
a kind of a rowdy street with a bunch of taverns. Wow,
and here I thought it would had some like deep
layered meaning, but it's actually literally like a bully in
(01:56):
an alley and singing about how great are well? I
love I love the trend and I love the song.
But why are we talking about this on our podcast, Matt,
Because this was an actual job. Being a c shanty
singer was an actual job. What Yeah, so we're gonna
ride this trend. Let's just take advantage. Oh my god, guys,
(02:19):
there's there's a very tiny then diagram of job sleete
topics and current trends, and I think it's just this topic.
What an opportunity to educate the folks by tricking them
with this trend. So you know that song soon may
the Wellerman come? That's the big Yeah, that's the big
one started this a yeah, right? That actually is not
(02:42):
a shanty? What we we're dropping some real knowledge here
on job sleep. Wait, but that's the that's the song
that started the whole trend. Yeah, I'm just kind of
being like one of those like snobs right now. It's
technically not a C shanty because it's not a work song.
A C shanty is is a work song. So what's
(03:05):
the actual definition of a C shanty. Well, it's a
type of traditional folk song that was commonly sung as
a work song, specifically for these sailors on these big
sailing merchant sailing vessels. We spoke to someone who has
been quite busy lately because of this CE shanty trend.
(03:28):
Dr revel Car. Hi, I'm Dr Revel car I'm an
associate professor of ethno musicology and the director of the
John Jacob Niles Center for American Music at the University
of Kentucky. And I do have a book that is
largely about sailor songs and sea shanties. And my book
(03:48):
is called Hawaiian Music in Motion and the subtitle is
Mariners Missionaries? Are We Mariners? Minstrels and Missionary's. Even he
doesn't know the name of his own book, he is
so qualified for this episode that he he loses track
of all his qualifications. He literally he literally wrote the book.
(04:12):
He can't remember the name of the book, but he
literally wrote the book. And I feel so bad for
him because, you know, right now with this trend, like
everybody's bugging him. But he he spent some time with us.
Not only that, but he sang a sea shanty with
us on TikTok, which we will we will preview that
at the end of the show. So anyway, Yeah, a
shanty is a work song. A shanty is a work
(04:35):
song that was typically sung aboard a sailing ship during
the nineteenth century, and these were deep water sailing ships
where shanties were typically sung. Not so much aboard coastal
schooners or fishing boats and things like that, but deep
water sailing ships that traveled across the ocean's intercontinental shipping
(04:57):
primarily packet ships which carried argo, or whaling ships that
were kind of slow, slow ships that traveled all over
the world hunting for whales. As for the word shanty,
I think there's not a lot of agreement on where
it comes from. I think my best theory is that
it comes from the word to chant, or the French chanterre,
(05:21):
so just that it's derivative of chanting. Ah chanterre. I
can see how chanterre becomes shanty. Now another thing about
these these merchant ships and these sea shanties on these ships,
it wasn't just one group of people. When we think
of CEA shanties, most of them are old guys, well
(05:44):
specifically Anglo Saxon. Yeah. Like, but actually you see evidence
of shanty men all over the world, Pacific Ocean, Atlantic Ocean,
all kinds of different countries, different ethnic groups. It's a
it's a worldwide phenomenon. So it really evolved through African
American sailors. The best guess as to how shanties evolved,
(06:07):
I think right now is that it did come from
African American workers, primarily in southern ports and of course
sailing ships in the nineteenth century. American ships in particular
often had African Americans on the crew, and I think
maybe people are not fully aware of this, but particularly
aboard whaling ships, African American crewmen were a pretty common thing.
(06:31):
Many of the whaling ships that came out of places
like Nantucket were owned and operated by Quakers, and the
Quakers were heavily involved in the abolitionist movement. Wow, so
they weren't enslaved African Americans. They were free men who
were well, I guess if it's the late eight hundreds,
it was after the Civil War, so they were free. Yeah,
(06:53):
but even before the Civil War, the Quaker whaling ships
had African Americans who were free. But yes, the South,
especially in the Caribbean, of course, there were many men
working these ships who were shantymen who also happened to
be enslaved. So what we find is like this is
something that is actually quite multicultural. Yeah, I'm actually really
(07:16):
surprised to learn that the evolution of the shanty came
from African American sailors because when you see the most
of the clips on TikTok, it seems like it's it's
like an Irish thing or Scottish thing from back in
the day. So like, how did those two groups interact
for this to evolve. It's just a matter of practicality.
For like, if you had a merchant ship, you needed
(07:38):
workers wherever you could get them, and so they a
lot of times they didn't care where you came from.
And so this it's it's really cool. Actually the diversity
on these ships. It's pretty amazing. Frank Bullen, who wrote
a great book called Songs of Sea Labor that I
think came out around nineteen eleven. They all described African
(07:58):
American sailors as the best shanty singers and that if
you had a black singer on board, that was that
was who you you would want leading your shanties. You know.
The music was really coming from a black tradition and
then became appropriated and expanded upon by Irisian, Scots and others.
It's especially aboard whaling ships that these ships were multicultural places.
(08:23):
They were among the first multicultural workplaces in American society. Wow,
that is really cool, and that makes sense that if
you're you know, sailing from port to port that it
is very international because the ships are coming from all
over the world and they're congregating in in the various ports,
and it's kind of like the first international city right
(08:45):
where there's like people from all different places coming together.
There were still all kinds of discrimination and marginalized groups,
you know, but once you got on that ship and
you were out out at sea for several months, and
this is a place where people of color could actually
achieve higher ranks and even out rank some of the
Caucasian sailors. So that was kind of a weird thing too.
(09:09):
I'm kind of split listening to that clip about like,
you know, pointing at the black guy on the ship,
ending like that guy should be this chantyman. Because on
the one hand, I understand, like, you know, African American
culture had a lot of musical tradition that you would
want to adopt and sort of you know, draw from.
(09:31):
But if you're pointing at the one black guy and
the ship being like, hey, you must be a good singer,
that's kind of like when I'm the only Asian in
the room and they're like, hey, you must be good
at math, and I'm like, oh no, no, yeah, rude.
If you're looking at me for math, help, That's that's
sort of like a little bit of racism there. But
(09:52):
I understand, like if you want to draw from the tradition,
but just having me like, oh, the black guy obviously
is the best best singer, that's ounds hella racist to me. Helen.
(10:13):
What do you think the if they did actually have
like a job posting for shanty man, what would be
the requirements for skills needed for this job? Definitely keeping
a beat, right, because I feel like that's to me,
it makes sense why the song would even come about,
is like you need you need a good beat like
boom boom, and then you gotta keep a tune. I mean, well, Helen,
(10:36):
you are wrong, really, I know. I was surprised to Okay, yeah,
Like when I was researching this, I was like, hold up,
Like actually, the how they determined who was the shanty
men was who was the best sailor. They were chosen
for their seamanship, not their musical talent, because again, most
of these folks couldn't sing it, it didn't matter. So
(10:59):
the song was is to sort of give direction on
what to do on the boat. So you're like, hey,
grab that or buddy start or ring now like like that.
There were several skills that the shanty men needed to master,
one being their knowledge of the ship and all the
different jobs on the ship, and so shanty singers shanty
(11:22):
men needed to be skilled, able bodied seamen who knew
the ropes literally and knew their way around a ship
because they needed to know all the different jobs, and
then they needed to know which shanties fit with each
specific job, so they would know the difference between hauling
halliard versus working the capstain versus working the pumps, whether
(11:45):
we needed a walk away shanty or a short drag,
all kinds of knowledge of the different jobs. So that
was key, and so they were in many ways among
the most skilled semen aboard the ship. Ah, this makes
so much sense. This is why you would never hire
like Adele or Ariana Grande to be the shanty man
on your phone, because they can sing, like, they can
(12:09):
sing their hearts out, but they don't know anything about sailing.
I mean, there are no shanty women that we know of.
That's another weird thing. That's what we call it shanty
man because it was all men on these ships. Uh, Like,
I'm sure there were exceptions, but that's kind of another thing.
Is like I'm sure some of the singing was actually
quite terrible. Like I that's what I imagined anyway. That's
(12:32):
so interesting. But it's interesting that what he was saying
about having to know all the different roles and having
to know specifically and and sort of leading the actions.
So you're you're the shanty man. You're like, hey, Paul Roger,
you're screwing it up. Pull faster, Yeah, they essentially were
like they were managers, you know, they were they knew
(12:53):
how they were good leaders and so and when we
when we think about the actual songs, it was call
in response and it was like a director directing an orchestra,
like they were. I guess you could compare it somewhat
to an orchestra. You know, it would have been actually
pretty cool though it to witness, like all of them
work together in this way. So it was a tough job.
(13:14):
That's I can't stress it enough, but yeah, Rebel's gonna
explain that specifically, like what these shanty men experienced on
these ships. Life as a seaman aboard any kind of
ship in the nineteenth century was rough. The work was
really hard. You were frequently wet and cold. The food
(13:35):
was bad. So one of the things that chantymen often
did was use their songs as a way to express
the cruise dissatisfaction with the conditions on board the ship.
So they'd sing about weevily biscuits or meat so tough,
it's like leather, and they would come up with ways
(13:56):
to talk about it, and singing about those hardships in
the way was a way around being accused of being complaining,
so you could just say, oh, that was just the song.
We're just singing a song, it's not really So it
was a way for the crew to get their grievances
out without really getting in trouble for it. Now, as
for the conditions of work for the shanty man, and
(14:19):
there might be multiple shanty men on a ship, because
it wasn't always that the crew were all working together.
Crew cruise aboard sailing ships were divided into watches, which
means one group of sailors would work for four hours
and then the port watch would work for the next
four hours, and so you'd go four hours on, four
(14:41):
hours off, all day and all night. But what it
also meant was that they're probably needed to be two
shanty men, one who could work with one watch and
another who could work with another watch. I love the
concept of shanty shift work, like like, hey, shanty man, A,
I'm taking the first shift. You yeah, I got second shift,
(15:02):
And they're like, oh, oh, I gotta get ready for
my shift. La la la la la la la. But
also I love the idea that they used the songs
to complain about the food but not and then and
then be like, no, I wasn't. I wasn't complaining about
the food. It was just a song whatever, Like this
meat sucks so hard, it really sucks so hard. What
(15:25):
are you complaining about the meat? Noah, Man, that was
just a song. Kind of like a comedians will, like,
you know, they'll say things that are too controversial to
say because oh, no, I'm just joying a comedian. I'm
just joking, joking. It's just a stroke, man, it's such
a joke. I was thinking, like when he was saying
that there was multiple shanties going on at once, Like,
at first, I was thinking, like, how would that even
work when that they all be like yelling over each out,
(15:47):
singing over each other. But again, these these ships were
often very big, so I guess that they were spread
out enough. And oh, you could have like a back
portion shanty and a front portion shanty. You're right, it
be hard because because we weren't a lot of the
songs improvised. So it's not like if you had two
shanties they could get on the same page and sing
the same song, because if the song was made up
(16:09):
on the spot, the shanty lyrics were largely improvised. A
real talented shanty man would be able to improvise lyrics
on the spot and make the song basically about whatever
they wanted to beyond the first couple of introductory verses
and the repeating choruses and the repeating refrains, and then
(16:29):
beyond that. Yeah, just I think they needed to know
a lot of songs. They needed to have a good
repertoire of melodies, and they needed to have a voice
that could carry and be tuneful. Wow, that is so cool.
I think we do because of the trend that's happening
now with the Shanties, we assume that all the shanties
were written down because we're following along, you know, especially
(16:53):
if you're duetting with someone on TikTok, they're singing a
very specific song and then you're learning the lines that
they sang and saying along with them. But like the
original Shanties were improvising a lot of the songs and
making them very specific to their their boat situation, which
I think is it's very similar to the way stand
up comics do when they're, you know, at a club,
(17:15):
Like I am a stand up comic and I do
a lot of crowd work, and often that's the most
popular thing that happens in my act is the crowd
work because it's specific to that audience, right, So you
make fun of the guy with the big ten gallon
hat in the fourth row, or you you know, a
waitress drops an entire tray of drinks and you've got
to call that out. So that's that's sort of similar
(17:36):
to my line of work, where you're calling out whatever
is happening in the room at the moment. So, Matt,
what happened to the shanty man? Why did that go away?
(17:57):
By the American Civil War, the anti songs were very
common on pretty much any merchant ship around the world,
Like this was when it was at its peak, i
would say, But then soon we had the steamship that
entered the picture. Shanties declined primarily because of the rise
of steam engines. And it is a little ironic that
(18:20):
shanties developed because of the developing technology that was being
used aboard sailing ships. But it was the continuing development
of those technologies and the addition of steam engines that
ended up bringing about their end. And I'm not just
talking about steam engines that propelled the ship, but also
steam engines that were used aboard the ship. In place
(18:42):
of sailors, a lot of ships carried what was called
a donkey engine, which was a small steam engine that
would be up on the deck of the ship and
that you could use. You could just attach a rope
to the winch on the steam donkey and it would
raise the sail for you, or it would raise the
anchor for you. And so the cruise of the ship's
(19:03):
got smaller, the number of people you needed to run
the ship got fewer and fewer, and so there was
less and less call for actual work songs being sung
the And then I would just maybe also just say
the one place still today that you could be hired
as a shanty man with shanty man in your job
(19:24):
title is Mystic Seaport Museum in Connecticut. Yeah, like with
most things, automation helped to make this job sleep, because,
like he was saying, like on a sailing ship, you
needed to have like thirty people to pull this huge
sale to go up and then pull it back down
when it needs to come down. But if that's all
being automated by steam, then yeah, So the Mystic Seaport
(19:47):
apparently it's the largest maritime museum in the United States
and it has. I didn't even know about this place,
but I want to go so badly after the pandemic's over.
But like, I imagine that this place is going to
be very popular now because of the sea shanty trend.
But Revel kind of sums it up why this trend
(20:08):
has come now. I think that, for one thing, I
think we don't have a lot of opportunities for group
singing in our society today. Singing the national anthem at
a baseball game or a football game that was about
as close as we would get to groups singing, and
even that we're not doing that right now. Church singing
(20:30):
again is another place where people do have that communal
singing experience, But there's not a lot of secular occasions
for groups of people to hear their voices joined together
with other singers. And I think that's one of the
reasons that people love sea shanties. The people who are
really into it love that aspect of getting together with
(20:52):
other people and just singing at the top of their lungs,
just belting it out. Doesn't matter if you can't sing
on he doesn't matter if you don't know all the words.
You'll learn the words get repeated enough that you pick
them up as you go along. It's just fun for people,
and it's a wonderful musical experience for people, even especially
(21:14):
for non musicians, to have that experience of making music
with a group of people and feeling all those voices
joined together. And honestly, that's my favorite thing about the
TikTok chanty thing, is seeing the different combinations of people,
that layering of the vocals. I would point out that
(21:34):
I don't think the Wellerman really took off until this
guy Luke the Voice added his super low base part.
And once you heard that base and the wonderful Scottish
tenor of Nathan Evans together, boy, that just made everyone
want to join in and be part of it. And
so I think there is something really special about singing
(21:57):
in a group, and we we've lost that in our culture,
and shanty singing is a way to bring that back.
I always say there are two things that bring people
of diverse backgrounds together the easiest, and those two things
are sports and music. So bringing the world together during
this turbulent time, thank you see shanties. It doesn't matter
(22:19):
if you have any musical experience or not. This is
for all of us. You know. Yeah, it's so simple.
Even Matt and I can sing a sea shanty. Oh
the make a chunk and he went bellow to take
a swing from his bat to hello, so early in
the board. Ohal's Baalon loves is back to low in
(22:43):
the board, and the same a loves is back to
low irish the board. The ladies love the Lordingiomaccio Lovesio lovesoves.
(23:26):
We make good sailors. Hey, I'm impressed with us, that's
I thought, because I'm not a singer, and I was like,
what I know, but that that was not bad. Well,
we want to hear from you as well. So if
you the listener want to share with us your sea shanty,
(23:47):
we would love to hear it and we will retweet it.
So tweet it at us at job Salete pod. We're
on TikTok as well at job Salete and maybe duet
with us or uh send us a video of you
trying to say ce shanty five times fast. Our expert
today was Rebel car. He's the author of Hawaiian Music
(24:10):
in Motion, Mariners, Missionaries and Minstrels. Thanks to ethel Vera
Ohmen and Sam Pope for graciously allowing us to use
their duet Bully in the Alley. You can find Ethel
on TikTok At Magin dot Bay That's m A j
I n Dot b a E and Sam Is on
TikTok At Sam Pope Music. Check them both out. They've
(24:31):
got great videos on their streams and not just shanties. Hey,
this is really important, but if you like job Slete,
please tell a friend and leave us a review on iTunes.
It's absolutely the best way to help us keep bringing
you these shows. It really does make a difference. Job
Slete is produced for I Heart Radio by Zealots manufacturing
(24:53):
hand Forge Podcast for You. It's hosted by us Helen
Hong That's Me and Matt Beat That's Me. The show
was conceived and produced by Jason Elliott, Steve's Zamarki, and
Anthony Savini. Our editor is Tommy Nichol, Our researcher is
Amelia Paulka, our production coordinator is Angie Hymes, and theme
(25:13):
music is by the mysterious Breakmaster Cylinder. Special thanks to
our I Heart Radio team led by Nikki Etore, Katrina Norvell,
Ali Cantor, Mangesh Hatti, Khador, Will Pearson, connal Burne and
Bob Pittman. Hey, did you know? You can find show
notes and more on our Instagram at job selete Pod
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