Burl Ives- Down To The Sea In Ships

This was 80 cents with discount.  I probably bought it for the sea shantys at the time.  Due to the personal enjoyment of the whaling/sailing record I posted last month, I decided to work this one into the equation a bit quicker than normal.

Oddly enough, I watched the Duke of Burl last night during TCM’s airing of East of Eden. His performance as Sam the Sheriff lends a steadying calm force against the turbulent forces but internally with the Trasks and externally with the march of World War I.  Well, don’t let the all wise, father figure act fool you. In 1952, in order to avoid blacklisting, he named Pete Seeger (with whom Ives had previously worked) to the House Unamerican Activities Committee as a possible Communist.  This is further complicated by the fact that he was a liberal democrat and strongly opposed to entering WWII until the Axis invasion of the Soviet Union .

But back to this album, released by Decca in 1956, it features Ives, along with the Ralph Hunter Singers performing 18 songs of the sea.  The instrumentation is basic but apt.  Pretty good selection of songs with a brief explanation of each as well as the phenomenon of singing at sea.  All are pretty good but the tracks I like were “Santy Anna”, “Haul Away Joe”, “Away Rio”, “Blow Ye Winds”, and the always apt, “Drunken Sailor”.

For a sample, I wanted to go with “New York Girls”.  It is not the best song on this album but it has two interesting points. First, as with other songs previously listed on this site, Liverpool’s “Maggie May” and “The Maid of Amsterdam”, this song focuses on the worldwide phenomenon of slightly suspect women separating poor sailors from their wages.  Second, if this song sounds familiar, you may have recognized it from Gangs of New York.

Also, I am posting “Leave Her Johnny Leave Her”, a song usually sang by the crew when the ship was homeward bound.

Despite any personal grudge I may have against Ives for being a coward in front of HUAC, this is a decent album.  Satisfactory.