Falmouth International Sea Shanty Festival

Falmouth Customs House Quay

The Guardian today has a short article Waves of emotion: what makes a great sea shanty? about the Falmouth International Sea Shanty Festival which took place in the town earlier in June. The Festival attracted singers from all over the UK as well as from Brittany and the Netherlands and featured performances at Customs House Quay, Falmouth harbour and on board the replica vessel Matthew. I wonder what Ned would have made of it all? :) Or indeed his brother Samuel Pellew who was His Majesty's Custom's officer at Falmouth for a time.

It's an interesting little article and the comments below are also worth a read. I was chuffed to see that someone has recommended Decemberists The Mariner's Revenge Song as their favourite shanty. venusinfurs90 gave me a copy of this last year, it's a fabulous song but much as I love it I had to stop listening to it because there is a very creepy curse in the middle of it that was keeping me awake at night!

Stornoway

I only managed to get out of the house once last week while I was on Lewis so unfortunately I have no pictures of glorious Hebridean beaches for you, so here's some picspam of Stornoway instead.

( This is what a working fishing port in the Outer Hebrides looks like. )