Chanteys from the Colcord Collection
2024 is the centennial of the first collection of American sea chanteys. Let's celebrate the life and work of its author: sailor, folklore collector, and social worker Joanna (Nan) Carver Colcord (1882-1960) of Searsport, Maine. Born on a sailing ship and raised at sea, Joanna Colcord left a rich trove of letters and memoirs as well as her books Roll and Go, Songs of American Sailormen, and GANGWAY! Sea Language Comes Ashore. Lynn's programs and resources explore Colcord's life at sea and share her favorites from the Colcord collections, most learned in the chantey tradition still vibrant today.
Programs can be tailored to your venue to include an illustrated lecture/demonstration (see slides), a concert (see video) and/or a singalong (see flyer). Chanteys are participatory work songs for community in action: great for libraries, museums, schools, historical societies, and any group looking to build community. Contact Lynn today or learn more below.
2024 Roll and Go Centennial Tour
- June 2: short program and participatory chanteysing, Live From the Mermaid's Tavern (online)
- June 7: Symposium on the Music of the Sea, Connecticut Sea Music Festival, Essex, CT (in-person/recorded)
- July 18: Penobscot Marine Museum, Searsport, ME (Colcord family home port) (hybrid)
- July 19: Sea chantey singalong, Searsport Shores Oceanfront Camping, Searsport, ME (in-person)
- July 20: Collectomania! Conference, Cecil Sharp House, London, UK (prerecorded video)
- August 6: Guest compere, Chantey Night in the Middle Bar, Anchor Inn, Sidmouth Folk Week, Devon, UK (in-person)
- August 16: Chantey crew at Craft Food Hall, Waltham, MA (in-person)
- August 25: Whaling Songs for Draw Me Ishmael: Book Arts of Moby Dick, Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA (in-person)
- September 15: Chantey crew for Minuteman Bikeway Block Party, Lexington, MA (in-person)
- September 28-29: Performer, Portsmouth Maritime Festival, Portsmouth, NH (hybrid)
- November 6-9: American Folklore Society National Conference, Albuquerque, NM (in-person)
Roll and Go: Songs of American Sailormen
- Freely downloadable audio file transcriptions of the complete 1964 SOAS collection for singers and scholars, including abc notes on variants considered rare in the living tradition today. Great for scholars who are not sight-singers looking to go back to the source!
The Colcord Collection on Spotify
Learn and compare over 150 versions of chanteys from Colcord's collection, from classic renditions by Stan Hugill and A.L. Lloyd to modern versions by 21st century chanteyfolk. Copy the playlist to add your own versions!MORE MARITIME PROGRAMS
RIVERS PROGRAMS
C'est l'aviron
Lynn Noel is based in Waltham, MA and has performed at maritime festivals in New England, the Great Lakes, the Pacific Northwest, California, the UK, the Netherlands, and the Baltic. Her clear, powerful voice is well suited to "real head-back-and-let-fly sea chanteys" (Mystic Seaport) and she offers a suite of special programs on women and the sea. Lynn is also a regional arts organizer as Program Chair of the New England Folk Festival and the founder of the Boston Area Chantey and Maritime Sing and of the Northeast regional maritime music network and events calendar www.nechanteysings.com.
Lynn is a professional heritage interpreter and independent scholar in geography, history, and folklore. She has received awards from the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), Natural Resources Council of America (NRCA) and the Country Dance and Song Society as a CDSS Local Hero. A former research fellow of the Institute of Arctic Studies at Dartmouth College, Lynn founded Digital Heritage Consulting to bring traditional song and heritage arts online to create digital community, with projects like the Mermaid’s Tavern online folk club and DIY Digital life coaching for artists and nonprofits seeking to adopt digital tools.
Lynn’s undergraduate and graduate work in geography and women’s studies prepared her well to explore and appreciate the personal and professional life of Colcord as a social scientist and world traveler. She owns a well-loved first edition of Roll and Go: Songs of American Sailormen and can at least hum a few bars of the bulk of the Colcord collections.
Digital Storytelling for Online Audiences
Traditional chanteysingers are all about melody, rhythm, and harmony. Old-school explorers live for maps and charts. Historians build timelines. Telling such a sweeping story as Joanna's calls out for new ways of storytelling to reach a digital audience that craves interactive visuals. Check some out below!
Download or print a Program Flyer for a participatory singaround with Lynn featuring a round dozen of favorite Chanteys from the Colcord Collection.
Click through to the Voyages map and turn the layers on and off to see where Joanna's father sailed with and without his family.
Play the Globe animation to watch Joanna's route around the world through the southern oceans.
Pop out the Timeline into its own window and zoom and scroll through Joanna's life story.
Watch Al Arthur's Slideshow of Joanna's glass lantern slides from the Penobscot Marine Museum's collection.
Print yourself a Checklist of Songs of American Sailormen and see how many you recognize--or maybe can hum a few bars.
Group, sort, and search the Bibliography to explore the sources used in this program.
Slideshow of Joanna Colcord's photographs from her glass lantern slide collection at the Penobscot Marine Museum in Searsport, ME. Compiled by the late Al Arthur.
RESOURCES
Colcord Timeline.pdfCan You Hum a Few Bars_ Collected by Colcord.pdf