Sing. Paddle. Repeat—How voyageurs turned hard work into harmony

Q: What’s the secret for welding voyageurs into a unit?
A: Singing.

For centuries, when people did unbearably hard work — in America, those enslaved, coal miners, railroad builders, haulers of canal boats, prison chain gangs — they sang to coordinate their efforts, to make it smoother and maybe a bit easier.
Around the world, singing was part of every culture — women sang while weaving, spinning or doing laundry. Men sang while threshing grain and other daily tasks.

Sailors sang while hauling in their anchor and emptying the bilge, so it’s understandable that voyageurs, those jaunty French-Canadian canoemen, sang while paddling their fragile birch bark shells deep into North American rivers and lakes, Singing was a natural expression.

Old fur trade journals barely mention the singing — perhaps the clerks and partners had their heads full of trade business, but visitors to French-Canada paid attention and wrote about it in letters. Unfortunately, few writers made complete notes about the tunes, which are mostly lost to us.

If anyone had a fiddle or another instrument, they played only in the evenings, because during their days everyone needed to paddle. Musical instruments needed to be small and sturdy — a mouth harp, harmonica or flute, though somehow a few kept their fiddles intact, given the rough handling they would receive. At least one Scottish bourgeois brought his bagpipes.

Quote from an old voyageur: “… fifty songs could I sing …”

One bourgeois (the head partner) commented that his brigade could sing and canoe for 5 pipes. He counted 25 songs. Here’s the math — voyageurs paddled about 4 miles per hour on lakes or rivers without portages and took a pipe break every hour for about 10 minutes, so the men sang for 5 hours, and made about 20 miles.

Why did voyageurs sing?

• To paddle in unison. Singing coordinated them — it’s impossible to sing with one tempo and do something (paddle, march, dance…) to an entirely different tempo. Picture 10 or 12 paddlers, each dipping into the water with their own rhythm. Big oops!! With every stroke, those paddles could smack into other paddles, and probably each other’s hands as well.
• To speed up as needed — like navigating a fast downstream, where paddling faster than the current enabled them to maintain control, instead of going where the river took them. Double-time or triple- could accomplish that.
• To paddle for long hours without noticing (as much) how sore their muscles were. Singing kept their minds on what verse came next, buoying their moods, increasing their stamina.
• To humanize incredibly physical labor. They spent up to 18-hour days paddling through challenging waters, loading and unloading, portaging more than their body weight, tracking (towing) sometimes while wading in frigid fast rivers — and sang while performing near-miraculous tasks.
• To boost morale. Singing allowed canoemen to recall their homes and create a life in the pays d’en haut.
• To provide a forum for creativity and pleasure. Amusing themselves gave them joy.

Of course their bosses didn’t paddle or carry — that was beneath their station in life, as they viewed voyageurs as beasts of burden, instead of recognizing their great competence as highly skilled laborers.

While old contracts show that steersmen received extra pay for their superior knowledge, a lead singer or a cook — two lesser skills — weren’t necessarily compensated. In this 1801 contract of one ancestor who passed his singing genes on to us, Charles Peloquin Filix was paid well as gouvernail, with no mention of being a song leader.

 

How and what did they sing?

Usually one man sang the verses, echoed by the others on the choruses. Song leaders might take turns. They likely sang in unison, although men who could harmonize may have done so. 

Each song told a story, though sometimes convoluted: Some were drawn from old French ballads or from their French-Canadian community, while others, like complaintes or laments, were adapted to their daily realities.

Traditional French songs ranged from sad to robust — love ballads, patriotic songs, dancing and drinking songs. Favorites included:

• Voice le printemps (In the gay spring time), about love.
• Mon canot d’Êcorce (It is the paddle that brings us), in which a young man hears his sweetheart extol her family and her other lover!
• Le retour du mari soldat (The return of the soldier husband) reminds them of reconnecting after being gone from their loved ones for years.

Songs recalled them tragedies that occurred to their fellow canoemen:

• Petit Rocher (O little rock) tells of voyageur Jean Cadieux who helped his brigade escape from a band of warring Iroquois near the Grand Calumet, a notoriously difficult portage, but then became separated and died of hunger.

Songs described the unique and difficult situations men faced:

• Quand un Chrétien se détermine à voyager (When a Christian decides to voyage) Here a priest cautions potential travelers about the wild waters, the rapids, the portages, the mosquitoes and Indian attacks.
• In J’ai trop grand’ peur des loupes (They have me scared, those wolves), the men owned their real fears.

Long and repetitive songs had high value:

• A la claire fontaine (At the clear running fountain), which drops 2 lines and adds 2 more to each verse.
• Une perdriole (The op’ning day of May) which uses a pattern similar to The 12 Days of Christmas.
• En roulant my boule (A-rolling my ball), in which one’s prized duck is slain by a prince.

Repertoires included rounds, which could be stretched for a looooong time, as leaders might make up verses to extend a song. Songs commemorated special occasions, like the weather, spring, bravery and the women they loved.

More than 13,000 texts of French-Canadian songs have been collected at the Archives of Folklore at the University of Laval in Quebec. Unfortunately, most tunes weren’t recorded so remain unknown. In “The Voyageurs,” Grace Lee Nute devoted an entire chapter to “Voyageur Songs,” with music and French words and English translations (or summaries) to 16 songs.

Listen up 

To hear voyageur songs, the CD “Songs of the Voyageurs” is sung by the 30-voice men’s choir from the University of Moncton, New, Brunswick, Canada. It was available through the Minnesota Historical Society and came with an illustrated 48-page booklet written in 1966 by Theodore Blegen, the then-superintendent of the Minnesota Historical Society and professor of history. Check online for sources.

If your French is good and you can read music, check out this list from Winnipeg’s annual Festival du Voyageur website. https://heho.ca/en/voyageur-songs/ They include the French lyrics for 18 songs, and printed music for 10 of them.

Sing along with them — and discover their joy. Maybe it’ll even help to make your work easier.

Final Thoughts

• How did a newbie handle life in a brigade? Read my novel series about the Chronicles of an Unlikely Voyageur. “Waters Like the Sky” (Book 1): André gets a position to paddle middleman, then earns it. “Treacherous Waters” (Book 2): Problems compound on his second tour. “Uncharted Waters” (Book 3): Suddenly he’s guiding a single canoe.
• Subscribe to this blog and read posts as they are published!
• For what I’m researching, blog snippets or quirky discoveries, visit me on Facebook or Instagram (@nlnlnraj) I appreciate your comments.
• Book me as a speaker.
• Ask your library, local school, gift shop to buy copies.
• Be a voyageur for an hour—come to one of my presentations.

Sources

• “Making the Voyageur World: Travelers and Traders in the North American Fur Trade” by Carolyn Podruchny. University of Nebraska Press (Lincoln, Nebraska, and London, 2006).
• “Songs of the Voyageurs CD” by Theodore C Blegen. Minnesota Historical Society Press (St. Paul, Minnesota 1966).
• “The Voyageur” by Grace Lee Nute. Minnesota Historical Society Press (St. Paul, Minnesota, 1987). Chapter 4 is devoted to voyageur songs

Currently reading:
“Hanta Yo: An American Saga” by Ruth Beebe Hill. Doubleday & Co. (Garden City, New York, 1979).