Shanties by genre

Here are some lists of songs we sing, organised by category. The categories:

• Australian songs
• Canadian shants
• Death and Sadness more upbeat
• Death and Sadness slow
• Drinking Shants
• Goodbye songs
• Irish songs
• Land shants
• Light-hearted, hopeful or funny songs
• Limited range / easy to sing
• Love songs (valenshants)
• River shants
• Scottish songs
• She-shants
• Songs about Pirates
• Songs of the sea
• Songs with Birds in them
• Soulful Americana vibes / Bluesy songs
• Train shants

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Songs of the sea

• A-rovin’
• All coiled down
• Back to Broome
• Banana Boat Song
• Being a pirate
• Blood Red Roses
• Bold Riley-O
• Bones in the Ocean
• Bound for Darling Harbour
• Bound for South Australia
• Brisbane Harbour
• Bully in the Alley
• Bye Bye my Roseanna
• Captain O’Rourke
• Chicken on a Raft
• Downed and Drowned
• Eye on the Weather
• Fall Down Billy O’Shea
• Fiddlers Green
• Final Trawl (haul away my laddie o)
• Fish in the sea (windy weather boys)
• Galway bay
• Golden Vanity
• Good Ship Ragamuffin
• Haul and Drag
• Haul away Joe
• Heave away (me Johnnies/Jollies)
• Hog Eye Man
• Hoist up that thing
• Jenny in the Roadstead
• Jamaican Farewell
• John Paul Jones (set feet row)
• Keep hauling
• Le capitaine de St Malo
• Leave her Johnny
• Leaving of Liverpool
• Little Fishes
• Lonesome sea
• Mainsail Haul
• Marching Inland
• Mary Ellen Carter
• Moby Duck
• Molly Malone
• Mollymauk
• Mingulay Boat song
• Molasses Rum
• My Johnny’s gone what shall I do?
• Nancy Lee (played his ukelele as the ship went down)
• NorthWest Passage
• Oak and Ash and Thorn
• Ocean Liner
• Old Maui
• One more pull boys
• Padstow Farewell (it’s our sailing time)
• Paddy Lay back
• Pay me my money down
• Randy Dandy O
• Rio Grande
• Roll Alabama Roll
• Rolling up rolling down (we all get drunk in Tilbury town)
• Row me Bully Boys
• Rowing song
• Running down to Cuba
• Sailor’s Prayer (send down a dove)
• Santiana
• Shanty Gospel
• Skye Boat Song
• Spanish Ladies (caution some language in the originals)
• Still I love him
• Strike the Bell
• The Essex
• The Islander (Newfoundland)
• The Mermaid (ocean waves do roll)
• The Whale
• The Worst Old Ship (waiting for the day)
• The Wreck of the Dandenong
• This is a Shanty for Singing
• Tow ropes
• Travel these Ways
• Venezuela to Trinidad
• Water is wide
• Wave over wave
• Way me Susiannah
• We dark engine room
• Wellerman
• Whisky Johnny!
• Whup Jamboree
• Yo-ho Sebastian

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Drinking Shants

• All for me grog
• All of the hard days are gone
• Beer is great
• Beer beer beer (charlie mopps)
• Bootleg Gin
• Bully in the Alley
• Dooley
• Drink up your cider
• Doon in the wee room
• Fall down Billy O’Shea
• Finnegan’s wake
• Here’s a health to the company
• Humours of whiskey
• I’m a rover seldom sober
• Irish pub
• Martin (who’s the fool now, fie man fie)
• Oh Mollases Rum
• Parting Glass
• Rambling rover
• River driver (eat when I’m hungry, drink when I’m dry)
• Rye whiskey
• Rye Whiskey
• Sailor’s Prayer
• Tom Burleigh’s dead
• Venezuela to Trinidad
• What shall we do with the drunken sailor
• Whiskey you’re the devil
• Whisky Johnny
• We’re only going for one

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Train or Railroad Shants

• Big Rock Candy Mountain
• Johnny come down to Hilo
• Linin’ Track
• MTA (he never returned)
• New river train
• Old Moke’s picking on a banjo
• On the Railroad (Frisco Bay)
• Paddy on the railway
• Working on the new railroad
• Electric Passenger Train

River Shants

• Last Saskatchewan Pirate (and Australian versions: Sydney Pirate and Yarra Pirate)
• Long Hot Summer (Illinois River)
• Rolling up rolling down (all get drunk in Tilbury town)
• River driver
• Shawnee Town
• Shenandoah
• Yangtse River

Land Shants

• All of the train /railroad songs listed above
• Marching Inland

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Easy to sing

• Chicken on a Raft
• (Who’s gonna dig these) Graves
• Lampshade on
• Pretty work / Sammy’s gone away
• Shanty Gospel

Irish songs

• 1845
• All for me Grog
• Belfast Mill (weave and spin)
• Belfast Mountains
• Butcher Boy
• Dooley
• Eriskay Love Lilt
• Fall down Billy O’Shea
• Fields of Athenry
• Finnegan’s Wake
• Girl with the Black Velvet Band
• Humours of Whiskey
• I’ll tell me Ma
• Irish Eyes
• Irish Jaunting car
• Irish Pub
• Last Saskatchewan Pirate (and Australian versions: Sydney Pirate and Yarra Pirate)
• Lampshade on
• Long Hot Summer (Illinois River)
• Mary Mack
• McPherson’s Rant
• Molly Malone (cockles and mussels) (Cindy’s rewrite here)
• Old / Auld Triangle
• Paddy Lay Back
• Parting glass
• Pretty work / Sammy’s gone away
• Queen of All Argyll
• Red is the Rose
• Shanty Gospel
• Star of the County Down
• Still I love him
• Tanderegee
• Water is wide
• We’re only going for one
• Will ye Go Lassie go

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Scottish songs

• Campbeltown Loch
• Donald where’s your trousers
• Drunken Scotsman
• Doon in the wee room
• Eriskay Love Lilt
• McPherson’s Rant (sae wantingly…)
• Mist-covered mountains of home
• Roll Northumbria Roll
• Skye Boat song

She-shants

• A-piratin’ (Cindy original)
• Charlie is my Darling
• De Clisson
• Eriskay Love Lilt
• Irish Eyes
• I’ll tell me Ma
• Jinny Bingham’s Ghost
• Jenny in the Roadstead
• Katy Cruel
• Maggie May
• Molly Malone (Cindy’s version here)
• Red-haired Mary
• Queen of all Argyll
• Savage Daughter
• The Holy Ground
• The Mermaid (ocean waves do roll)
• The Miner’s Washing
• The Witches and the whales
• Twiddles
• When will we be Married?
• Will ye go Lassie go

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Goodbye songs

• All of the hard days are gone
• All the Good times are past and gone
• Bye Bye my Roseanna
• Fiddler’s Green
• Good night song
• Hard times come again no more
• Here’s a health to the company
• Mingulay boat song
• Old Maui
• One more pull boys
• Padstow Farewell (it’s our sailing time)
• Parting Glass
• Travel these ways

Love songs (Valenshants)

• Angeline the Baker
• Bye Bye my Roseanna
• Eriskay Love Lilt
• Hog-eye man
• I’ll tell me Ma
• Jenny in the Roadstead
• Little Fishes
• Little Liz (Eyes) I love you
• Lonesome sea
• Lowlands Away
• Retirement song (man of the land)
• Queen of all Argyll
• Still I love him
• Still I love him (duplicate)
• Ten thousand miles away
• The Milkmaid
• The Year turns round again (like Barleycorn)
• These are the things
• When will we be married?
• Will ye go Lassie go?
• Yo ho Sebastian
• You are my sunshine
• My Johnny’s gone what shall I do
• Leaving of Liverpool

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Slow songs about Death and Sadness

• (Bury Me Not) Lone Prairie
• Butcher Boy
• Crossing the Bar
• Dream Angus
• Hang me oh hang me
• Mist-covered mountains of home
• No Man’s Land / Green Fields of France
• Old/Auld Triangle
• One hundred feet
• See that my grave is kept clean
• Shenandoah
• Three Score and Ten (Grimsby Town)
• The Year Turns Round again (like Barleycorn)
• There ain’t nobody gonna miss me when I’m gone

Faster songs about death and sadness

• Finnegan’s wake
• Grey Funnel Line (not much chorus)
• Haul and Drag
• Hanging Johnny
• Mary’s Ellen Carter
• Rye Whiskey
• The Wellerman
• We’re all gonna die some day nautical version lyrics by Cindy Tonkin (or the original Kasey Chambers song)
• Who’s gonna dig these (graves)

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Australian songs

Songs written by Australians, set in Australia or about Australia in some way.

• All the originals here
• Back to Broome
• Bound for South Australia
• Brisbane Harbour
• Emu
• Green Fields of France (Willy McBride)
• Hey Rain
• I never learnt to Drive boys
• Last Sydney Pirate and Yarra Pirate
• Newcastle Big Boy
• The Good Ship Pasher Bulker
• The Ballad of Deb Lawrie
• Whistling in the Laundry

Songs with birds in them

• Emu
• Fields of Athenry
• Mollymauk
• Moby Duck
• Rattlin’ Bog
• Sailor’s Prayer
• Skye Boat Song

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Light-hearted, hopeful or funny songs

• All of the Hard Times are gone
• Dancing with Bears
• London Town
• Moby Duck
• Shanty Gospel
• This is a shanty for singing

Soulful Americana vibes / Bluesy songs

• Ain’t Nobody
• All the good times
• Byker Hill
• Come on up to the house
• Corn bread and butter beans
• Frisco Bay/On the Railroad
• Hard times come again no more
• Homeward Bound (bind me not to the pasture)
• Linin’ Track
• (Who’s gonna dig these) Graves
• White Collar Holler

Pirate Songs

• (It’s all part of) Being a Pirate)
• De Clisson
• Yo Ho Sebastian

Canadian Songs

• Banks of Newfoundland
• Barrett’s Privateers
• Last Saskatchewan Pirate (and Australian versions: Sydney Pirate and Yarra Pirate)
• Northwest Passage
• The Islander (Newfoundland)

Featured image: some of the Randy Dandy Shanters singing at a wedding on a tall ship on Sydney Harbour.

Left to Right: Clayton Vickery, Robert Boddington, Fergus Miller, Dan Werndly, Dan Schneider.

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Here is the official Shanties site. Please do not contact me about Shanty business – I’m a fan, not a captain. Talk to them on [email protected], Instagram, or their web page.