Sea Conditions - Swell Songs And Shanties for Breezy People

1-CD (Digipak) with 36 page booklet, 31 tracks. Total playing time approx. 79 min.

    Bear Family Records® presents with 'Sea Conditions' a musical journey through time and across the sea.

    32 Songs, all dealing with the elemental forces of the oceans and our longing, but also our concerns and respect.
    Stylistically we encounter on our journey shanties (just can't be missing!), folk songs, wonderfully kitschy tunes from the tiki drawer, the singing of beguiling sirens and mambo grooves, country and pop hits and much more!
    Petula Clark, the Kingston Trio, Pee Wee King, Hank Snow, the Easy Riders and many many others accompany us musically on our wild cruise - they all have plenty to tell about the hazards, the adventures and the glorious triumphs on the seven seas.
    Producer Marc Mittelalcher has compiled relevant information about each song for the illustrated booklet.
    The recordings were assembled from the best possible sources and carefully edited.

Mankind has always been mesmerized by the ocean – by water in general – sensing that all life came from the sea, even before contemporary science came up with a proof. And yes, life as we cherish it is often at stake when gigantic waves interfere with our little whimsy dreams, plans, and pursuits. Nevertheless, the ocean's fluidity, depth, vastness, and sheer power have inspired humankind to create great poetry, mythologize the vast waters, and build religions and pantheons of heroes around them.

Before mankind could fly, before there was outer space, and our kind had the technology to launch our mortal shell into the realms beyond, there was the lure of the seven seas. Polynesians, Vikings, Phoenicians, and many other peoples traveled the daring deserts of water to explore, trade, dominate and answer our ever-present need for change.

It is no wonder that man tried to portray the miracles, adventures, horrors, and beauty in song – to get a grasp, brag, immortalize, enjoy, and entertain: With his new production for Bear Family Records®, ‘Sea Conditions: Swell Songs and Shanties for Breezy People’ (BCD17563), Marc Mittelacher offers a wide array of nautical ditties. From shanties like Drunken Sailor to folk classics like My Bonnie Lies Over the Ocean (in a windy western swing version by Texan fiddler Cliff Bruner), Marc follows the trade winds to charm us with everything from Tiki-Kitsch to Mambo Mania. Along the way, he presents the inevitable La Paloma (by none other than Nova Scotian Hank Snow), as well as the obscure like Petula Clark's longing song Sailor. And to tell all you landlubbers about the wondrous places our wanderlust has led us to, we come Rollin' Home with The Easy Riders.

From Jimmie Driftwood to The Kingston Trio, from Martin Denny to Pee Wee King's Golden West Cowboys, from professional ballad-mongers to dead-earnest folk singers – ‘Sea Conditions: Swell Songs and Shanties for Breezy People’ has it all and calls you to sea – or to your bathtub at least. So, join us – drink, dream, dance - and drift away on the seven seas of song!