Shanties

Shanties are songs who came from the glorydays of sailing. They were sung in different languages. Most of the songs are in English. The songs have a clear function on board of the sailingships. They were mostly sung during the hard work on board of the ships to co-ordinate the work and to make it easier. The songs were sung by a “shantyman”. Shanties are to be found in different categories like: ballast-, spil-, pump- en boldersungs. Don’t forget the songs about saying goodbye, the danger, the women, the adventure and longing for the trip backhome.

Shanties are workingsongs and you can compare them with the songs who where sung by the slaves on the plantations. Some of these slavesungs have become shanties. Armstrong's Patent as much as: "do the heavy work", "kei. In Dutch we know the expression "ellebogen stoom". Armstrong's Patent a shantygroep, brings you a lot of traditional shanties en seasongs in different languages ,like English, French, German en Pidgin Englisch. We won’t forget our own language , Dutch.