Will 2014 be the Year of the Third Dutch Folk-Revival?

Happy new year.

I have taken a sort of semi-sabbatical those past few months, I now realize. I wrote less regularly than I used to do, I simply did not find the time, the energy, or the right topic. But I'll get back to the normal once-a-week rhythm in 2014, I hope.

Let me start with an intriguing question: will 2014 become the year of the third Dutch folk revival in the guise of a revival of the shanty - the seafaring songs of our nautical forefathers? I ask this question because a group called Ancora (meaning 'anchor' in Latin) is - in certain circles - hugely successful. They released a CD plus DVD called "Vrij als de wind" ('Free as the wind') last September, which immediately became the number 1 in the Dutch-language CD album charts. I saw the documentary of the DVD just two days ago on the regional TV station TV Oost, and it has also been broadcast on national TV. There is a definite link to the Volendam music scene, Jan Keizer (from BZN) acting as a a sort of Godfather for the group - whose members were well-known in a previous musical life as "De Piratentoppers" (pirates not referring to sea pirates but to illegal radio stations playing Dutch-language music called 'pirate stations' in the Netherlands).



I could already write a book about the Ancora phenomenon. About the way they represent themselves on and off screen; and about the gender and race issues in it. About the music; the puzzling relationship between Irish folk and sea shanties, for example (my own shanty choir sings Irish repertoire as well, but I am still not sure what the relationship is). About the repertoire - about their version of "Allen die willen te kaap'ren varen" and how that connects to for example the version of Fungus. Related to that: about the question whether this is the beginning of a third Dutch folk revival, about its relationship to the first (pre-second world war) and the second (1970s/1980s) revivals. Et cetera et cetera. I will write an article about it soon; the material is too rich to leave it aside.

What I would like to share with you here is Ancona'sown narrative about the birth of Ancora. On their website as well as in the documentary the members of Ancora claim that they were secret shanty lovers for some time, singing shanties in the car together, until there came a moment they had to 'follow their heart' and become Ancora in order to revive the shanty repertoire, on the brink of being lost, by modernizing it and thus making it acceptable for a broad audience. They even on their website quote John Sheahan (ex-Dubliner; plays the fiddle on 3 of Ancora's songs) who says that it is fantastic that a younger generation now continues singing the music of the sea.

No word, however, about the German group Santiano. But Ancora is simply a Dutch copy of Santiano, who became very popular in Germany in 2012 after releasing a mainly German-language CD with a mixture of pop, shanty and Irish folk. Actually, nearly the complete repertoire of Ancora is a duplicate of Santiano, and most of the songs are recent compositions rather than 'age-old shanties' in need of revival. And of course, Santiano also tells a story about how they were born not as a commercial enterprise but as a heartfelt continuation of an informal jam-session. Looking a bit further I will no doubt find the model for Santiano in yet another country, of course also claiming that they are a heartfelt et cetera et cetera, ad infinitum.

If I would be an ethnomusicologist from the 1930s, I would probably write about Ancona's repertoire, pointing out the un-authenticity of it all. If I would be an ethnomusicologist from the 1970s I would probably focus on the machinations of the music industry, indicating how we live in times where music has become merchandise.

But what interests me now is not all that. What interests me is the role-playing and the storytelling going on. Obviously, the people behind Ancora - whoever they are - believe that there is an audience out there waiting to buy the dreams Ancora is made off. What kind of dreams are they? What do they tell us about our times? How do the people behind Ancora know there is a need 'out there' - to which perceived needs are they answering, and whose needs are they? And are the audiences indeed buying the dreams Ancora fabricates, or are they building their own dreams, using Ancora as part of the bricks and mortar?

It is, to me, still all incredibly complicated. As I pointed out earlier, questions of taste in general, of good taste, and of my personal taste, are not relevant here. I am not a big fan of Ancora's music for reasons related to my personal musical biography, but that's hardly interesting for anyone but myself. What I do admire is the conscious effort that has gone into the creation of the Ancora dream - including the hiring of John Sheahan and the not-referring to Santiano, all part of it.

And mind you: this story-telling is not just part of the entertainment industry. It is not so that some of us are telling stories and others are leading real lives. Life is a story; storytelling is what we do always, everywhere, when musicking. Looking at Ancora makes you realize which stories are told and enacted by others: by André Hazes and by Lavinia Meijer, by André Rieu and by Gustav Leonhardt, by Lou Reed and by José Feliciano, by you and by me.