Singing the Sea: The Musical Life of Old Staithes

When we think about history, we often think about what was written down — records, diaries, official documents. But in Staithes, much of the village’s past was sung.

Songs carried stories. Hymns carried grief. Choruses carried community. And for generations, the people of Staithes filled chapels, cottages, pubs, hillsides and even the open seafront with music.

Just recently, we shared a Victorian Staithes cricket song on this blog (here) — full of local jokes and references — which offered a rare glimpse into the everyday humour and spirit of the village. It reminded us that when history isn’t formally recorded, music often becomes the best archive of our history.

Looking through the museum’s oral histories, memoirs and archives, a remarkable picture emerges of just how deeply music was woven into life here.

The Staithes Fishermen’s Choir (and the Friendly Rivalry)

In Staithes, singing belonged to both the chapel and the pub — and sometimes it was hard to tell where one ended and the other began.

The chapel choir was formally known as the Wesleyan Male Voice Choir. But whenever they performed outside the village, they were “invariably advertised and introduced as The Staithes Fishermen’s Choir.”

Their repertoire included rousing evangelical favourites like:

• Have a Little Talk with Jesus

• Sailing Home

• Carry Your Cross with a Smile

  
  

alongside slower, deeply atmospheric hymns such as:

• The Harbour Bell

• Eternal Father

• Saviour! Lead Me

  
  

The very last hymn ever sung in our building — then the Primitive Methodist Chapel — was There is a green hill far away… We still hold the original hymn sheets.

But here’s where it gets interesting.

The title “Staithes Fishermen’s Choir” was not only claimed by the chapel choir. It was also used by the regular singers in the village pubs. Hymns — especially those with seafaring themes — were as beloved in the public houses as they were in the pews.

This “cross-fertilisation” of sacred and social singing was a defining feature of Staithes life.

Singing on the Seafront (Before Peeling Off to Argue)

One of the most wonderful traditions recorded in our sources describes what happened on Sunday evenings.

Members of all three nonconformist chapels — the Wesleyan, Primitive Methodist, and Congregational (Bethel) — would gather near the seafront, around the area where the Cod and Lobster stands today.

They would begin an open-air hymn singing session together.

Then, as the time for evening services approached, the entire group would process up the High Street while singing.

As they reached each chapel, the groups would “peel off” at their own door, still singing.

It was often observed that:

“Harmony might pervade the highly enjoyable singing of hymns in the open air — but it was never allowed to enter in the chapel door.”

Once inside, fierce denominational rivalries resumed.

Getting the Pitch

Before instruments were common in the chapels, the singing was led by individuals.

One of them was Argy Verrill, remembered by the artist Laura Knight in her autobiography. She describes how he would:

“stand in the aisle at the end of his pew, his right hand cupped round his ear, which, he said, helped him ‘git t’pitch’.”

You can almost hear the sound of a packed chapel following his lead.

Songs in Cottages, on Hillsides, and in Concerts

Music wasn’t confined to services.

George Manning-Saunders recalled spending evenings in fishermen’s cottages:

“singing songs of hundreds of years ago, handed down from parent to child.”

Oral histories record fragments of local lyrics, including:

“Between Whitby and Scarborough lies Robin Hood’s Bay,There dwells a fair lady both gallant and gay…”

and a mysterious song titled Rumpsey Bumpsey Bay.

Alf Pearson remembered:

“A man with a banjo gave particular pleasure… We used to go up on the hill and he’d take his banjo, and we’d go up there, groups of us, and sing to our hearts’ content.”

At village concerts, a popular performer named Jarge would sing Green Broom — “about twenty verses, rather coarse at the end.” Another favourite included the unforgettable line:

“Rusty bums and jolly old chums,To hell with the man that works…”

This was not polite Victorian parlour music. This was living, communal, village music.

When Music Met Tragedy at Sea

In Staithes, hymns were not only for joy — they were for survival and farewell.

A legend grew from the 1888 lifeboat disaster that the crew were saved because a passing steamer heard them singing hymns across the waves.

Before a fatal collision in 1870, a fisherman asked his son to sing:

Jesus, at Thy command, I launch into the deep

The hymn later became a staple at Staithes funerals.

Narrative poems in our archives — about wrecks such as the Samtampa and the Pebba — likely fed directly into this singing tradition, turning maritime tragedy into shared, remembered song.

The Sound of Staithes in Its Dialect

The rhythm of Staithes speech itself had a musical quality.

Dialect poet Stanley Umpleby, writing in the Whitby Gazette and for the Yorkshire Dialect Society, captured what he called the “music of the speech” of Staithes people in poems like The Ballade of Staithes.

Even when not sung, the words themselves carried the cadence of the village.

A Tradition That Still Lives

The museum holds cassette recordings of the Staithes Fishermen’s Choir singing the “old rousing hymns of the Moody and Sankey type” — the kind that, according to oral histories, were “always on” in Staithes homes on Sundays.

And the choir still exists today.

This is not a lost tradition. It is a living one.

Music as Memory

For a village like Staithes, where much everyday history was never formally written down, music became the record.

It carried humour. Faith. Rivalry. Grief. Community. Survival. Dialect. Identity.

If you want to understand old Staithes, you don’t just read it.

You have to hear it.