# What's that sailor music called?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-that-sailor-music-called/156378
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [February 20, 2003, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-that-sailor-music-called/156378 "2003-02-20T18:34:49Z")
**Posts on this page:** 17
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Trigonal\_Planar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trigonal_Planar)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2003, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-that-sailor-music-called/156378/1 "2003-02-20T18:34:49Z")
Anyone know what that silly music is that they play in cartoons when there’s a sailing scene? It’s not the “Drunken Sailor” song. Its sort of a flutey, tooty bit.
Doo do do do do
Doo do do do do do do do
Dooo do do do
Dooo do do do do do do do
duhhdaaa ddadda ddaaadaa ddaadda dddaaaaada ddaadda
da da da
I THINK it may have a line something like
And I never never ever really cared about the weather
'Cuz the weather never ever really cared for me!
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### Author:  [@MonkeyMensch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MonkeyMensch)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2003, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-that-sailor-music-called/156378/2 "2003-02-20T18:39:36Z")
The Sailor’s Hornpipe?
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### Author:  [@Gary\_T](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gary_T)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2003, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-that-sailor-music-called/156378/3 "2003-02-20T18:40:33Z")
Sailors Hornpipe.
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### Author:  [@KarlGauss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KarlGauss)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2003, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-that-sailor-music-called/156378/4 "2003-02-20T18:40:55Z")
Is it Song of the Volga Boatmen? If so, it’s by Stravinsky.
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### Author:  [@Gary\_T](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gary_T)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2003, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-that-sailor-music-called/156378/5 "2003-02-20T18:46:36Z")
Most sites do list Sailor’s Hornpipe (with the apostrophe). Here’s the verse you were thinking of:
Oh, a sailor’s life is the life for me
How I love to sail o’er the bounding sea
And I never, never, ever do a thing about the weather
For the weather never ever does a thing for me!
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### Author:  [@Phlosphr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Phlosphr)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2003, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-that-sailor-music-called/156378/6 "2003-02-20T18:52:26Z")
I think what **Trigonal** is referring to is a Sea Shanty…
See [here](http://www.rendance.org/shanty/) .
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### Author:  [@KarlGauss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KarlGauss)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2003, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-that-sailor-music-called/156378/7 "2003-02-20T18:59:49Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by KarlGauss \*
> \*\*Is it Song of the Volga Boatmen? If so, it’s by Stravinsky. \*\*
Please ignore my post. I missed the lyrics that you mentioned. The doo’s and do’s threw me off.
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### Author:  [@raygirvan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/raygirvan)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2003, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-that-sailor-music-called/156378/8 "2003-02-20T19:38:41Z")
It’s more correctly the College Hornpipe, though it’s commonly called the Sailor’s Hornpipe. [Here’s](http://www.leeds.ac.uk/music/Info/RRTuneBk/gettune/000009f0.html) the score for it (or alternatively, the [mandolin tablature](http://www.users.csbsju.edu/~eknuth/mandotab/collegeh.html)).
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### Author:  [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2003, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-that-sailor-music-called/156378/9 "2003-02-20T19:43:41Z")
And an earlier thread. . .
[http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=69272](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=69272)
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### Author:  [@rowrrbazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rowrrbazzle)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2003, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-that-sailor-music-called/156378/10 "2003-02-20T20:34:55Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by KarlGauss \*
> Is it Song of the Volga Boatmen? If so, it’s by Stravinsky.
Stravinsky did not compose that. It’s a folk song. Stravinsky did an arrangement of it.
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### Author:  [@Padeye](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Padeye)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2003, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-that-sailor-music-called/156378/11 "2003-02-20T21:30:27Z")
Here’s a midi of Sailor’s Hornpipe. The links in the other thread are gone.
[http://wilstar.net/midi/sailpipe.htm](http://wilstar.net/midi/sailpipe.htm)
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### Author:  [@Trigonal\_Planar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trigonal_Planar)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2003, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-that-sailor-music-called/156378/12 "2003-02-20T22:43:00Z")
Wow…gotta love how a question bugging you for days gets 10 answers in a single afternoon.
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### Author:  [@raygirvan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/raygirvan)
#### Post date: [February 22, 2003, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-that-sailor-music-called/156378/13 "2003-02-22T02:22:29Z")
Nine of them wrong… Check the sources. This is one where the brainless propagation of a misnomer has all-but-swamped the long-standing correct answer available by pre-Internet sources It is not the f\*\*\*ing Sailor’s Hornpipe, but the College Hornpipe.
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### Author:  [@mouthbreather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mouthbreather)
#### Post date: [February 22, 2003, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-that-sailor-music-called/156378/14 "2003-02-22T04:28:19Z")
I guess you feel pretty strongly about the nomenclature of the music of the high seas.
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### Author:  [@odd-socks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/odd-socks)
#### Post date: [February 22, 2003, 9:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-that-sailor-music-called/156378/15 "2003-02-22T09:25:38Z")
eh, well, to my internet ears it sounds like “Greensleeves” - although I wouldn’t class that as being “silly” to fit with the OP? It’s more, umm, gentle sounding in places?
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### Author:  [@Achernar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Achernar)
#### Post date: [February 22, 2003, 10:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-that-sailor-music-called/156378/16 "2003-02-22T10:27:15Z")
Drat. This music makes me want to dance a jig. I’ve been jigging nonstop since **Padeye** posted the link to the MIDI.
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### Author:  [@Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Seldon)
#### Post date: [February 22, 2003, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-that-sailor-music-called/156378/17 "2003-02-22T14:16:29Z")
The melody is also found in H.M. Jollies by Kenneth J. Alford. One of my favorite marches, when listening to it played, it makes you feel like you’re on the high seas.
I believe the “popeye” part is also heard in his “A life on the Ocean Wave”
To clarify, I am not proposing Alford actually made up the popeye tune, it’s one of the old sea shanty’s that he included in his marches.