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Shallow Brown

by Debra Hannis

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diane russell
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diane russell A stunning ethereal vocal range from the very talented Debra
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[ Roud 2621 ; Ballad Index Doe044 ; trad.]

This West Indies sea shanty demonstrates the close link between sea shanties and slave songs. It was collected by Cecil Sharp and by Stan Hugill who included it in his Shanties from the Seven Seas (1961).

H.E. Piggott and Percy Grainger collected Shallow Brown from the singing of John Perring of Dartmouth on January 18, 1908, and Grainger subsequently composed an arrangement of this song between August and December 1910, as is shown in the film Passion (1999), which is based on Grainger's life. Grainger himself commented:

[Perring] was a remarkably gifted deep-sea sailor songster and said that this song was supposed to be sung by a woman standing on the quay to Shallow Brown as his ship was weighing anchor. Perring did not know why Brown was called “Shallow”—“unless it was that he was shallow in his heart”, as he added. My setting aims to convey a suggestion of wafted, wind-borne, surging sounds heard at sea.

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released May 24, 2016
Trad. Arr Hannis / Loomes

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Debra Hannis Gloucester, UK

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