This is the real Cape Breton fiddle-playing, the old school mastery of an era before rock star mannerisms came into the world of Celtic music. Buddy MacMaster- uncle of Natalie MacMaster, an even more famous Cape Breton fiddler- plays in the genuine old Gaelic style, fast enough to be lively and interesting but never too fast for the dancers to follow.

This kind of fiddling was always intended for social events such such as ceilidhs and barn dances, which is exactly what makes it “folk” music. People usually treat that word as if it was just a genre of music, but strictly speaking it's not a genre at all. Folk music is a context, a way that music is used and experienced in people's lives. If you learn a song from your mother or a fiddle tune from your uncle and then you share it later at a house visit or a dance, then that song or that tune is functioning as folk music- even if it was originally Top 40.

So, considering that “Fifteen Men on a Dead Man's Chest” is not an actual pirate song, are there any surviving examples of the genuine article? The answer is yes. This ballad is called “The Flying Cloud” and it was sung widely among both sailors and lumberjacks in the 19^th century.