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Use this link to read more about sea shanties and watch videos about their history.

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Sea shanties are traditional songs originally created and sung by sailors at sea.

Singing has been a part of life at sea for centuries. But sea shanties traditionally take a very particular form:

They are generally 'call and response' songs, with one singer (known as a 'shantyman') leading and everyone else replying with the chorus.

They have a regular, heavy rhythm. There may be dozens of versions and verses, but the tune and tempo remain constant.

What's the difference between sea shanties and other sailor songs?

Sea shanties were work songs, devised to accompany particular actions or tasks on board ship.

They could help keep time among groups of sailors, coordinate physical movements like hauling ropes and raising sails, and relieve the boredom of long, repetitive tasks.

How the Sea Shanty originated is not difficult to discover. It has undoubtedly grown out of the natural inclination one feels in hauling, or in otherwise performing any rhythmical operation, to keep time with one's voice, feet or hands, in parallel rhythmical sound.
William Saunders, 'Sailor Songs and Songs of the Sea', 1928

Why are they called sea shanties?

The term 'sea shanty' itself first emerged in the 1800s. One often proposed origin is that it came from the French word 'chanter', meaning to sing.

Others have linked it to the English word 'chant', or even made connections with other work songs: North American lumberman songs for instance often began with the line, 'Come all ye brave shanty-boys'.

What is the history of sea shanties?

Historians have traced examples of what might be called sea shanties back to at least the 16th century. However, the songs as we know them really flourished during the 19th century on board large sailing ships.

"A lot of people assume that these songs was naval, but it was predominantly merchant ships where these songs were sung," says historian Kate Jamieson. "That's why you have so many songs about whaling for instance."

Square-rigged vessels like Cutty Sark required groups of men to coordinate in hauling ropes and setting the sails. Ships' equipment such as the capstan - a type of winch often used to raise anchor - also needed multiple people winding together for long periods.

That explains the rise of the sea shanty: they helped make these hard group tasks easier - or at least more bearable.

The purpose of a hauling shanty was rhythm to the task of extracting just that last ounce from men habitually weary, overworked and underfed.
Harold Whates, 'The Background of Sea Shanties'

How does this relate to African culture and music?

'Call and response' is one form of music that has roots in the continent of Africa. Here, one person sings a line of a song, and this is repeated by the rest of the group.

Music, like people, has always travelled whether through a family, community, country, even crossing the world. When people travel, they take their music with them. This is especially true for people who travel for their jobs like sailors and people with things to sell.

British ships often had multi-ethnic crews as sailors were recruited from across the world, and black sailors have served on British ships for over 450 years. There were many cultural and musical influences on the development of shanties, as different groups of sailors sang songs together to get through the work day.

You can find out more about black sailors and sea shanties via the educational resources produced by the English Folk Dance and Song Society.

British, American and Australasian sailors all had their own versions, but it wasn't just English-speaking crews who sang while at work. French and Breton sailors for instance have their own shanty traditions, including songs such as Le Capitaine de San Malo.

As steam ships began to replace sailing ships in the latter half of the 19th century however, the type of work on board ship changed - and so did the musical accompaniment.

What types of sea shanty are there?

Each type of shanty was traditionally linked to the job at hand.

'Short drag' shanties were designed for short, hard bouts of pulling. A song like ' Haul on the Bowline' is a good example of this: every time the crew shouted 'haul' during the chorus they could give the rope another hard tug:

Haul on the bow'lin
The bow'lin haul

The well-known 'Drunken Sailor' is a different kind of short drag shanty, a 'hand over hand' shanty with two or more pulls per verse.

Long haul or ' halyard shanties' by contrast are songs for more sustained periods of pulling. Shanties like 'Blow the Man Down' included multiple rambling verses: the crew could rest while the shantyman displayed his lyrical skill:

Come all ye young fellows that follow the sea,
Way-hay, blow the man down,
And pray pay attention and listen to me,
Oh give us some time to blow the man down.

Other types include capstan and pumping shanties, designed for periods of relatively easy but continuous effort.

"The more you listen to them, the more you pick out the timings and the calls and responses," says Jamieon. "Listen to the one about Napoleon, 'Boney'. It begins with, 'Boney was a warrior,' and then everyone yells back, 'Way, hey, ya!' It keeps you in time when you're pulling lines, but it also keeps you motivated."

"The more lyrical ones are different," she adds, "perhaps used when sailors were relaxing in the evenings. There's a lovely one called ' Leave her Johnny ', which is more of a song than a work song."

On board an Indiaman, Capt Robert Williams (BHC1080, © National Maritime Museum)

The differences can be hard to pick out today, but it seems that a well-chosen song could make a "great difference" to the job at hand.

The sailor's songs for capstans and falls are of a peculiar kind, having a chorus at the end of each line. The burden is usually sung, by one alone, and, at the chorus, all hands join in -and the louder the noise, the better. With us, the chorus seemed almost to raise the decks of the ship, and might be heard at a great distance, ashore.

A song is as necessary to sailors as the drum and fife to a soldier. They can't pull in time, or pull with a will, without it. Many a time, when a thing goes heavy, with one fellow yo-ho-ing, a lively song, like "Heave, to the girls!" "Nancy oh!" "Jack Cross-tree," etc, has put life and strength into every arm.

We often found a great difference in the effect of the different songs in driving in the hides. Two or three songs would be tried, one after the other; with no effect;-not an inch could be got upon the tackles-when a new song, struck up, seemed to hit the humour of the moment, and drove the tackles "two blocks" at once. "Heave round hearty!" "Captain gone ashore!" and the like, might do for common pulls, but in an emergency, when we wanted a heavy, "raise-the-dead" pull, which should start the beams of the ship, there was nothing like "Time for us to go!" "Round the corner," or "Hurrah! hurrah! my hearty bullies!"
Two Years Before the Mast by Richard Henry Dana Jr

Why are people singing sea shanties on TikTok?

In December 2020 Scottish singer Nathan Evans uploaded a video of himself singing a song called 'The Scotsman'. Another of his performances, 'The Wellerman', quickly gained momentum, with other users inspired to add their own duets, harmonies and responses.

#ShantyTok was born.

From violin accompaniments to electro remixes, TikTok has given new life to these hard-working, long-lasting songs of the sea.

Had to add my violin to this! #tiktok #seashanty artists are tagged in the video! pic.twitter.com/tQI3Mpeap4
- Mia Asano (@miaasanomusic) January 5, 2021

"Different people are perhaps becoming more aware of these songs thanks to TikTok, but shanty bands have been popular for years. In Falmouth there's even an annual sea shanty festival," says Jamieson.

Why have they caught the imagination? "They're simple, the choruses are relatively short, they're not difficult to learn, they have a nice rhythm - all qualities which made them good to work to in the first place!" Jamieson suggests.

"Some years ago the game Assassin's Creed: Black Flag led to an interest in shanties, and now we're seeing them rise again. I think it's worth everyone discovering the background to these songs."

What does 'The Wellerman' song actually mean?
Claire Warrior, senior exhibitions curator at Royal Museums Greenwich, explains the history of TikTok's viral sea shanty:
'The Wellerman' is a New Zealand folk song, which refers to 19th century right whale hunting.

Whales were big business at this time: the streets of London were illuminated by burning whale oil, and whale oil and baleen (the bristly plates some whales use to filter their food) were used in products from corsets to umbrellas and soap. Right whales were so named because whalers thought they were the 'right' whales to hunt - slow moving, they swim close to the shore, yield large amounts of oil, meat and baleen, and float when they are killed.

The first shore-based whaling stations in Aotearoa New Zealand were established in the 1820s. 'Wellermen' were the ships owned by Weller Brothers of Sydney who supplied provisions to the whalers, including, yes, "sugar and tea and rum". There doesn't seem to have been a ship called Billy of Tea, but a 'billy' was a metal can used for boiling water.

By 1839, some 200 ships were working in the waters around the country, but this industry (and it was an industry, such was the scale) led to a complete collapse in the whale population by the 1850s. At least 150,000 southern right whales were killed in the whaling trade, hunted nearly to extinction. Even today, they number only about 7,500.

Whaling was a brutal business. 'Tonguing' refers to the tonguers, men who would cut up the whales on shore; they also often acted as intepreters with Māori communities, who also worked as part of the whaling crews.

'A busy day at Grytviken whaling station, South Georgia, March 1926' (PAF7070, © National Maritime Museum)

This vivid watercolour by Alister Hardy comes from further south, from the remote Grytviken whaling station in South Georgia. In the 1920s, Hardy was the zoologist for the 'Discovery' investigations, sent south to research whales, their food sources and the ocean itself, to ensure that they did not become extinct.

Discover more

Find more stories of the sea at the National Maritime Museum and Cutty Sark

Shop nautical gifts

Browse our best selling books, or pick up nautical inspired homewares

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Sea shanties are traditional songs originally created and sung by sailors at sea. Singing has been a part of life at sea for centuries. But sea shanties traditionally take a very particular form: They are generally 'call and response' songs, with one singer (known as a 'shantyman') leading and everyone else replying with the chorus.

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Use this link to help you prepare for the singing and body percussion part of the sea shanties topic.

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Free online lessons for students across a variety of UK school curriculum subjects

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Use this link to learn about African Music.

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Free online lessons for students across a variety of UK school curriculum subjects

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Year 7 Half Term 2 African Music Worksheet

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Year 7 Half Term 2 African Music Worksheet

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Read the information and complete the questions in full sentences.

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Use this link to access an online stylophone. Try to play the riffs from the sheet on the next link

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Web Audio Stylophone - Recreating the classic miniature synthesizer with the Web Audio API

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Play the famous riffs from this sheet on the virtual stylophone.

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Year 7 Half Term 4 Harpsichord Virtual Piano

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Year 7 Half Term 4 Harpsichord Virtual Piano

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Use this link to access an online piano. Try to play the Pachelbel's Canon parts from the sheet on the next link

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Virtual Piano - Online Piano Keyboard | OnlinePianist

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Use a computer keyboard, mouse or touch screen to play a virtual piano keyboard. Our virtual piano simulates a real piano keyboard experience.

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Year 7 Half Term 4 Harpsichord Pachelbel's Canon Sheet Music

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Year 7 Half Term 4 Harpsichord Pachelbel's Canon Sheet Music

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Play the parts from Pachelbel's Canon from this sheet on the virtual piano.

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Use this link to read and watch videos about the origins of the ukulele.

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Where did the ukulele originally come from?

The ukulele's classical roots have been explored most recently in a collaboration between Browning, Hinchliffe and lutenist Elizabeth Kenny's ensemble Theatre of the Ayre. Called Lutes 'n' Ukes, it unites the Renaissance guitar and 20th-century ukulele. 'The Portuguese braguinha and lute would have been contemporary instruments and played together in Elizabethan times,' says Browning.

'One of our orchestra plays a Renaissance guitar that just happens to be a four-course instrument with re-entrant tuning, very much like the ukulele.' And the project also links two homonymous composers from very different eras: Robert Johnson (1583-1633), the Tudor lute composer, and Robert Johnson (1911-38),the guitarist.

The ukulele first arrived on the shores of Hawaii in 1879 in the guise of the Portuguese braguinha, a small four-stringed instrument from the island of Madeira, closely related to the mainland cavaquinho. One man, João Fernandes, learnt to play on the four-month sea voyage to Hawaii and legend has it that islanders were so impressed with the speed of his finger work that they named the instrument 'ukulele', or 'jumping flea'.

Another (possibly more credible) explanation for its name came from Hawaiian royalty. Princess Likelike was herself a ukulele player and explained that the name meant 'the gift that came to here'.

Royal seal of approval also came from King David Kalakaua and Queen Lili'uokalani, who both played and composed on the instrument. With their endorsement it soon became central to the sound of Hawaiian music. 'It brings a bouncing counterpoint to the rhythm guitar and a gut or nylon string timbre to groups of steel instruments,' guitarist and ethnomusicologist Bob Brozman explained to me back in 2006. 'And of course it provides a rhythm for singing as well as slack and steel guitar.'

In 1915, the ukulele hit the US. A highly portable and inexpensive instrument, it sparked a craze and quickly became a staple of vaudeville, jazz and country music. Across the Pacific it was introduced to Japan in 1929 by Hawaiian-born Yukihiko Haida and its popularity has never diminished - in fact, the country is considered the ukulele's second home. The instrument is loved by young Japanese, best exemplified by the flash mob group Ukulele Afternoon, who descend on beaches and shopping malls to play as a group and describe their form of playing as 'Punk rock combined with the sensitivity of a chamber orchestra'.

George Formby and the ukulele

Here in the UK, the 'uke' is most commonly associated with George Formby, the comedian and film star who played a banjolele - a ukulele hybrid with a banjo resonator body. (The ukulele actually comes in a number of forms, from the tiniest sopranino to the rather more guitar-like baritone.) Formby ignited a passion for the instrument in the Beatles' guitarist George Harrison, who had a ukulele in every room of his house, and other celebrity players include Paul McCartney ( pictured), and comedian Peter Sellers.

Although Formby was an impressive player, it's that jaunty 'Leaning on a Lampost' association that has sunk the instrument's reputation in the eyes of many people. But for classical guitarist Nick Browning, the ukulele is a very serious proposition. 'I came to the uke as a challenge,' he explains. 'As a classical guitar student, I was very pleased with myself when I'd cracked one of Bach's fugues on classical guitar. Then I heard a violinist playing it on just four strings and I wanted to know how they were doing it. So when I discovered the uke I set out to challenge myself to do just the same.'

What are the 4 strings on a ukulele?

Adding to the restriction of a small fretboard is the ukulele's 're-entrant tuning', which is also found on instruments such as the five-string banjo and means that the strings don't run from low to high - instead, they begin with the G above middle C, then drop down to middle C itself before rising up to E and then A. This high register gives the ukulele its characteristically bright sound, but limits the range to that of a descant recorder.

'With the re-entrant tuning, it's an exercise in minimalism,' explains Browning. 'You have to imply a lot as there's no bass note. It's a small instrument with a tiny range, so you have to orchestrate carefully. But by using the high G and playing across the strings, it does allow you to achieve that campanella - or bell-like - sound that would have been heard in Elizabethan music. So the ukulele has the potential to connect people to a vast repository of classical and contemporary music.'

The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain

The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain has become a national institution, with a repertoire that ranges from classical to punk, and spaghetti western to '70s disco, all performed on instruments with just four strings (a solitary acoustic bass guitar gets in on this technicality). The orchestra has played a major part in popularising the ukulele, with sales at music stores booming and the instrument becoming a mainstay of schools' music curriculum. But it's been far from an overnight sensation.

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The ukulele: where it originated from and how it become popular

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Wipe those images of wacky George Formby songs and randomly strumming primary school groups from your mind. The hugely popular ukulele has a very noble heritage, says Matt Swaine

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Use this link to help understand how to play 4 chord songs. We will be learning how play 4 chords on ukulele.

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Free online lessons for students across a variety of UK school curriculum subjects

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Use this link to access online lessons on the blues.

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Free online lessons for students across a variety of UK school curriculum subjects

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Use this link to access an online piano. Try to work through the Kung Fu Keyboard pieces. Remember to use the correct fingers on your right hand - Thumb is 1 and little finger is 5.

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Virtual Piano - Online Piano Keyboard | OnlinePianist

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Use a computer keyboard, mouse or touch screen to play a virtual piano keyboard. Our virtual piano simulates a real piano keyboard experience.

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Use this sheet music to play through the pieces from Kung Fu Keyboard on the virtual piano.

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Use this link to learn about performing as part of a band.

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Free online lessons for students across a variety of UK school curriculum subjects

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Use this link to learn about setting lyrics to music.

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In this lesson, we will learn about the different ways words can be set to music and how verses and choruses are structured. We will learn how to generate ideas and write our own verse of a song. We will then explore various ways to refine our ideas.

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Use this worksheet to help you write your own verse for 'Gangsta's Paradise'.

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Use this link to learn about EDM and remix.

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Free online lessons for students across a variety of UK school curriculum subjects

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Log on to your account on edu.bandlab.com
Remember your username is your school email address
firstname.surname-student@themarvellcollege.com
Then follow these instructions to help you remix 'Shotgun' by George Ezra

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Use this link to learn about film music.

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Free online lessons for students across a variety of UK school curriculum subjects

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Year 8 Half Term 6 World Cup Song Project

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Year 8 Half Term 6 World Cup Song Project

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Use this sheet to help you create your own verse for 'Three Lions'

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Year 8 Half Term 6 World Cup Song Project Remix

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Year 8 Half Term 6 World Cup Song Project Remix

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Log on to edu.bandlab.com
Your username is your school email address
firstname.surname-student@themarvellcollege.com
Click on your class
Click on Three Lions Remix
If you have not started it yet, click start assignment and choose teacher assignment.

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Use this link to help you complete the work in the booklet on the next link.

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The elements of music can be seen as being the building blocks of music. Without them, music (of any style/age) would not exist because sound itself would not exist!

Think of the elements of music like the crucial elements of a car. A car needs wheels, an engine, brakes, doors, a chassis, a steering wheel, etc.. Without these key elements it will no longer be a car. Without the key musical elements a piece of music will no longer be music.

What are the elements of music?

Here is a quick run through of the main musical elements (you will come across variations of this, but these are the crucial ones):

- how high or low a note sounds
Rhythm - the pattern of regular or irregular pulses caused in music by the occurrence of strong and weak beats. (In everyday language this is the "groove").
- the length of a musical note
- the way in which an overall piece of music is arranged into similar and contrasting sections.
- how loud/quiet the music is (either the overall sound or of individual notes/instruments within it)
- the beat of the music
- the way in which melody, rhythm and harmony are combined in a piece of music. What each part/instrument is doing at any given point.
- the speed of the pulse
- the tone of a musical note
- the key in which a piece is written (can change as piece progresses)
- the relationship between 2 or more simultaneously sounding notes

Why are the elements of music important?

They are important for 2 reasons:
1. Performing/analysing Music - An understanding of the musical elements will enable you to understand any piece of music, whether you are trying to perform the piece or analyse it. If we know the key elements that make up a car then we can use them to compare any car around the world from a Ferrari to a pickup truck by asking some simple questions - "What size engine does it have? What colour is it? How many wheels does it have? etc.." In the same way, we can understand any piece of music by asking questions - "What is the tempo? How loud is it? What key is it in? What instruments are playing? Etc..."

2. Composing Music - The musical elements are your "composer's toolbox" - without a clear understanding of the elements of a car you will never be able to build a car. Without a clear grasp of the elements of music your ability to write music will be seriously compromised and you will not be able to reach your potential as a composer (whatever style you are wanting to write in).

The different elements of music are covered in different music theory videos and lessons around the site. I hope they help you on your musical journey.

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The Elements of Music - Music Theory Academy

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The elements of music can be seen as being the building blocks of music. Without them, music (of any style/age) would not exist because sound itself would

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Complete the work in the booklet. You can use the music theory academy link on the previous link to help you. You can complete everything apart from the listening task.

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All year 9 Music lessons will be on here. Use your school email address to log in. You can complete the fast 5 and classwork on here. Any bandlab tasks can be completed on edu.bandlab.com

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Using your school email address, log in and open up our class One Note page. Use this to follow each lesson, completing the fast 5 and classwork/bandlab tasks.

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Using your school email address, log in and open up our class One Note page. Use this to follow each lesson, completing the fast 5 and classwork/bandlab tasks.