Sea Shanties | Forgotten Melodies #2
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Show notes
For this week's bonus episode, we have something very special for you - the second installment of our new series, Forgotten Melodies, which is all about folk music, featuring explorations of types of folk song and original recordings which put fresh spins on trad tunes!
In this episode we are talking all about Ben's absolute favourite kind of folk song, the Sea Shanty, as well as 'Songs of the Sea' more generally - including three brand new versions of classics of the genre, "Haul Away Joe," "Santiana," and "Spanish Ladies."
If you've never heard of a Sea Shanty then don't worry - as ever, Eleanor and Ben will talk us all through the song-types' musical features, and Martin will become increasingly befuddled by nautical terminology!
We'll be chatting through their history, too, from the roots of the form in African and African American work songs to which kinds of nautical musics were prohibited by the Navy, the reasons why shanties died out (and so quickly roared back into popularity) as well as other rum-soaked mysteries.
Such as, why did pirates definitely not play concertinas? What does it take to make something 'ship shape and Bristol fashion?' And what exactly does it take to stop a cat?
This one has it all: stolen wooden legs, sandy bottoms, and plenty of 'Drawing Room Safe' terminology that is very likely to make you giggle!
We really hope you enjoy it, and will see you on deck, sailor - once you've swabbed the galley, shivered your timbers, and paid the Shanty Man his dues, of course! Gyaaaargh!
About Three Ravens 🔮
Three Ravens is a completely independent English myth and folklore podcast where we share stories, celebrate folk culture, and fall backwards through the hedgerows of history.
Hosted by real-life couple Eleanor Conlon and Martin Vaux, and mostly recorded at our home in rural Sussex in southern England, Three Ravens is rated 4.8/5 from over 500 reviews and has grown by word of mouth care of our lovely listener community ‘The Conspiracy of Ravens.’
We release three episodes a week, on Mondays, Thursday and Saturdays, through which we explore folktales, folkways, fairy stories, folk songs, mythology, local heritage, seasonal customs and traditional beliefs.
Our research inspires our retellings of stories from across history and culture, with episodes standing alone but connected together across over 500 chatty, mostly light-hearted, swear-free installments driven by passion, kindness and curiosity.
Now ranked as an all-time Top 5 podcast across several categories by Goodpods, charting in the Spotify, Apple and Rephonic UK Fiction Top 10 across 2024, 2025 and 2026, if you’re interested in ghosts, monsters, regional beliefs, and the things that unite us all, then join us round the campfire and listen in…
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