PORTLAND, Maine There once was a tune that tickled the Internet’s fancy/When TikTok revived the humble sea shanty/The views came fast, the fad could last/Go, read about it go: People are stuck at home, toiling away, getting bored, going stir crazy. Cooped-up sailors who felt the same way on long ocean journeys broke […]
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People are stuck at home, toiling away, getting bored, going stir crazy.
Cooped-up sailors who felt the same way on long ocean journeys broke up the tedium with work songs called sea shanties.
It only makes sense, then, that shanties have come full circle with a moment of unprecedented popularity during the pandemic.
“Times are tough. If we can sing, it’ll help us get through it, just like sailors did on the tall ships,” said Bennett Konesni, of Belfast, Maine, who started singing sea shanties aboard a schooner in Penobscot Bay and performs several times a week with the Mighty Work Song Community Chorus.
COVID-19: Sea shanties return amid isolation of the pandemic
AP, PORTLAND, Maine
People are stuck at home, toiling away, getting bored, going stir crazy. Cooped-up sailors who felt the same way on long ocean journeys broke up the tedium with work songs called sea shanties.
It only makes sense, then, that shanties have come full circle with a moment of unprecedented popularity during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Times are tough. If we can sing, it’ll help us get through it, just like sailors did on the tall ships,” said Bennett Konesni, of Belfast, Maine, who started singing sea shanties aboard a schooner in Penobscot Bay and performs several times a week with the Mighty Work Song Community Chorus.
Yo, ho, ho, why sea shanties have a go
Life during the pandemic has revived the popularity of the songs sailors used to sing to defuse tension and maintain their sanity amid isolation and cramped quarters on ocean journeys.
By DAVID SHARPAssociated Press
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Bennett Konesni sings a sea shanty while raising a sail on his ketch on Thursday in Belfast, Maine. Konesni started singing sea shanties aboard a schooner in Penobscot Bay and has since traveled the world studying work songs. The app TikTok helped sea shanties surge into the mainstream. Robert F. Bukaty/Associated Press
There once was a tune that tickled the Internet’s fancy