Post Songs of the Sea Shanty Pub Sing

Post Songs of the Sea Shanty Pub Sing moves the maritime music from Parade Plaza as part of the CT Maritime Heritage Festival into Oasis Pub on Saturday, September 12, with veteran chanteyman Marc Bernier hosting an informal night of sea songs immediately following Songs of the Sea 2026.

The pub sing begins at 7 p.m. at Oasis Pub, 16 Bank Street in downtown New London, almost as soon as The Dreadnoughts finish the final set of the free Songs of the Sea concert across the street.

There is no announced band lineup and no conventional stage show to watch.

That’s the point.

A pub sing turns the audience into part of the music. Someone starts a song, the room picks up the chorus and another singer eventually launches the next one. Expect traditional chanteys, maritime songs, drinking songs, Irish and British folk material and whatever else the singers in the room happen to know.

And Saturday should bring an unusually deep bench of people who know the songs.

From Parade Plaza Straight Into the Pub

The timing is deliberate.

Songs of the Sea runs throughout Saturday afternoon at Parade Plaza as part of the Connecticut Maritime Heritage Festival, with six acts representing different corners of maritime, traditional and folk-punk music.

None Of Us Saints opens at 2 p.m., followed by Littlefield & Morneault, Marc Bernier, Hold Fast and New London’s My Druthers.

At 6 p.m., Canadian folk-punk band The Dreadnoughts takes the final slot, finishing at approximately 6:45.

Then everyone has to do is cross the street.

The poster for the evening couldn’t make the transition much clearer:

“Starts when the concert ends.”

Oasis Pub sits at 16 Bank Street, directly across from the Parade Plaza area. Its normal Saturday opening time is 7 p.m., which essentially allows the afternoon concert crowd to walk out of Songs of the Sea and into the next round of singing.

This Time, Marc Bernier Isn’t Just Performing

Bernier already has a 3:30 p.m. performance slot at Songs of the Sea.

A few hours later, his role changes.

He becomes the host.

That’s a good job for someone who spent more than 30 years on staff at Mystic Seaport Museum, including five years working as one of the museum’s chanteymen.

Bernier has also worked as a musician and educator with the Hudson River’s Clearwater program and has sailed aboard traditional vessels as a cook, deckhand and entertainer from Maine to the Chesapeake Bay.

His repertoire draws heavily from Ireland, Britain and the northeastern United States, particularly maritime songs, pub songs and drinking songs.

He accompanies himself on guitar, mandolin and tenor banjo, but his musical background goes considerably further. Bernier plays bodhrán in Irish music and frottior, or rubboard, in Cajun and Zydeco music.

He’s also been part of Connecticut’s fife-and-drum community since his teenage years, performing and teaching and eventually taking his fife playing throughout North America and Europe.

For the pub sing, however, Bernier’s most important instrument may simply be his voice.

He’s a traditional song leader.

A Pub Sing Isn’t a Concert

If you’ve never attended a maritime pub sing, don’t expect Saturday night to operate like the concert that precedes it.

There doesn’t need to be a carefully programmed set list.

There may not even be a clear separation between performer and audience.

One singer starts.

Everyone who knows the chorus joins in.

Then somebody else takes a turn.

Some songs may be accompanied by instruments. Others work best with nothing but voices.

People who don’t know a song can usually figure out the chorus after hearing it once or twice.

That’s one reason maritime music lends itself particularly well to this kind of gathering.

Many of the songs were designed for participation in the first place.

A Chantey Was Music With a Job

The sea chantey began as working music aboard sailing vessels.

A chanteyman supplied the verses while sailors responded together on the chorus or refrain. The rhythm helped coordinate physical labor that required several people to pull, push or move at the same time.

Different kinds of work produced different kinds of chanteys.

Halyard chanteys helped coordinate the heavy pulling involved in raising sails.

Short-drag or short-haul chanteys suited jobs requiring shorter bursts of effort.

Capstan and windlass songs accompanied longer, repetitive tasks such as raising an anchor.

Not every song sailors sang was a work chantey, either.

When the day’s labor ended, sailors also sang for entertainment. Those recreational songs are often called forebitters, a name associated with sailors gathering near the forebitts on deck during their free time.

That distinction gets blurred today, when “sea shanty” is frequently used as a catch-all description for almost any traditional maritime song.

At a pub sing, the distinction matters less than the chorus.

The Songs Were Built to Be Learned Quickly

There was a practical reason chanteys relied so heavily on repetition and call-and-response.

The crew needed to join in.

A sailor didn’t need sheet music or formal training. The chanteyman could improvise verses while everyone else supplied the familiar response.

That structure has given the music remarkable durability.

Someone can walk into Oasis Saturday knowing none of the songs and still participate.

Listen to the first chorus.

Listen again.

By the third one, sing.

There aren’t many musical traditions where a complete newcomer can become part of the ensemble in less than a minute.

New London Already Has a Living Shanty Scene

Saturday’s pub sing isn’t an attempt to manufacture a maritime tradition for festival weekend.

People are already singing these songs here.

Oasis has hosted Sea Shanty Nights featuring New London groups My Druthers and Bards of Gungywamp. One was held as recently as August 28.

Those evenings mix sea songs, Celtic folk, old maritime tunes, drinking songs and working-class ballads.

My Druthers has become particularly closely connected to the local scene.

The New London-based rotating collective, led by Stuart Fensom, approaches maritime music from punk-rock roots. Its repertoire combines traditional chanteys, Irish rebel songs and working-class folk, often using guitar, fiddle, banjo and mandolin.

Bards of Gungywamp takes another expansive approach, mixing Celtic folk and chanteys with bluegrass, old-time music, country, Cajun influences, punk and original songs inspired by New England history and folklore.

The result is a maritime music community that isn’t especially interested in keeping traditional songs sealed behind museum glass.

People still sing them because they’re fun to sing.

Saturday Could Produce an Interesting Room

The timing of this particular pub sing makes it different from an ordinary shanty night.

Look at who’s playing across the street during the afternoon.

Littlefield & Morneault are veteran maritime musicians with deep connections to traditional sea music.

Bernier is performing.

My Druthers is performing.

The Dreadnoughts are in town.

None Of Us Saints and Pennsylvania Celtic-punk band Hold Fast are on the bill.

The organizers haven’t announced a lineup of special guests for the Oasis sing, so nobody should assume that every Songs of the Sea performer will appear.

But New London will have an unusually large concentration of maritime, Celtic and folk-punk musicians within a few blocks Saturday.

A pub sing is exactly the kind of event where that matters.

Oasis Is a Natural Place for It

Oasis Pub has been part of New London’s downtown music culture for years.

It’s small.

That’s an advantage for this.

A room built for hundreds of spectators would work against the intimacy of a traditional pub sing. Oasis puts people close together, where one unaccompanied voice can start a song and the rest of the room can answer.

The Bank Street bar is primarily known for craft beer and live music, with 20 rotating drafts and a large selection of cans alongside wine, cocktails and nonalcoholic choices.

It’s also emphatically a music bar.

Touring and regional bands have passed through its small room, while its current programming ranges from indie rock and punk to DJs, movie nights and maritime music.

For Saturday’s pub sing, the modest size should make the distinction between stage and audience almost irrelevant.

There’s a Long History Behind Singing Sea Songs in a Pub

Maritime music and drinking establishments have been companions for a very long time.

Port cities were filled with boarding houses, taverns and waterfront saloons catering to sailors between voyages.

Songs traveled with them.

A sailor might learn a melody in one port, carry it across an ocean and hear it again with different words somewhere else. Chanteymen borrowed from folk songs, popular music, minstrel songs, spirituals and whatever else circulated through the ports.

Songs evolved because they were transmitted person to person.

There was no definitive recording to consult.

That helps explain why the same traditional maritime song can exist under different titles, with different verses, melodies or even choruses.

A pub sing continues that oral tradition in miniature.

Nobody needs to perform the definitive version.

There probably isn’t one.

From Maritime Heritage to Maritime Participation

Much of the Connecticut Maritime Heritage Festival is understandably about looking.

Visitors can look at ships.

Tour historic sites.

Watch demonstrations.

See exhibits.

Learn about whaling, submarines, the Coast Guard, the Navy and the people who built their lives around the Thames River.

Songs of the Sea moves a little closer to participation by putting living maritime music in the center of downtown.

The Shanty Pub Sing finishes the journey.

There isn’t really an audience anymore.

The old songs survive because somebody starts singing them and somebody else answers.

That’s what Saturday night at Oasis is for.

Songs of the Sea ends across the street around 6:45.

Oasis opens at 7.

Marc Bernier starts a song.

The rest is up to the room.

Details

Event: Post Songs of the Sea Shanty Pub Sing
Date: Saturday, September 12, 2026
Time: 7 p.m.
Host: Marc Bernier
Venue: Oasis Pub
Address: 16 Bank Street, New London, CT 06320
Ages: 21+
Format: Informal participatory maritime pub sing
Music: Sea chanteys, maritime songs, folk songs, pub and drinking songs
Related Event: Songs of the Sea 2026 at Parade Plaza
Songs of the Sea: 2–6:45 p.m.
Location From Concert: Oasis Pub is across Bank Street from the Parade Plaza area
Saturday Oasis Hours: 7 p.m.–2 a.m.
Phone: 860-447-3929
Food: Oasis is primarily a bar and music venue rather than a full-service restaurant
Drinks: Craft beer, canned drinks, wine and nonalcoholic options are available
Participation: No maritime-music experience is necessary; pub sings are built around group choruses and audience participation

 

 

Featured image is an artistic representation inspired by the event and may not depict the actual people, location, or activities shown.