Tag: shanty

Let’s celebrate seafood!

Allison

We were invited to perform for a few afternoons at the Prawn and Seafood Festival this summer (May 17-June 16). We’d not heard of that event before, but Steveston is a great little corner of the mainland and seafood deserves its own festival, so we said yes, without knowing much about what to expect.

Our first afternoon was Saturday, May 18. There was an awning set up for us, and banners waving all along the boardwalk. We sang three sets while trying not to be distracted by the scent of fish and chips, or the sight of fishing boats, or people on the boardwalk with their cute dogs and kids, tantalizing ice cream cones, or bags of sea urchins and spot prawns fresh from the fishing boats!

We came with our favourite shanties and just passed the songs around and around, repeating some in the next set, or running through our lists for more options. It was fun to take a looser approach to the presentation and it kept us on our toes, musically, as we weren’t sure exactly which tune the next singer might choose.

Singing outdoors is always a challenge, but the location made it worthwhile. We get to do it all again on June 8, the official Spot Prawn day.

Solo Shanties? An oxymoron!

Allison

The Lazy Jacks, like many other musical (and other) groups, tried the online approach to our usual rehearsals. Using Zoom meant we couldn´t sing harmony for each other to hear, and we missed the warmth and laughter of meeting in our kitchens or dining rooms. Some of us adapted quite easily to the restrictions on socializing, and streamed other sessions, and even joined in a few shanty sessions across the continent. But it wasn´t the same.

Respectfully, we reviewed two main aspects of the COVID-19 guidelines for safe meetings:

  • Outside
  • Distanced

And we looked at our own requirements:

  • A roof to keep us dry
  • Good acoustics
  • Inexpensive
  • Adequate lighting

For the last few months, we´ve been meeting in the corner of a underused public parking garage! It´s covered, but open on all sides, with decent lighting, and some pretty interesting acoustics.

We bring chairs, music stands, small clip-on lights for the stands, and music. And we can hear each other, and hear all of us together. And even better, we can see one another in real life, and smile, and make honest-to-goodness eye contact.

This being Vancouver, we might be able to keep on singing all winter in this location. I´m not sure how the acoustics would handle an open shanty session, but until group singing is no longer a ¨dangerous¨ activity — thanks to the pandemic — we´ll work on our repertoire from a safe shanty distance … 3 meters apart, 6 meters, and more. We´ll listen to the live harmonies echo off the the walls, and we´ll hope for better weather for us all.