The Music of Shackleton: A Change of Course

Tony Parker NESC
Aug 21, 2025
2 min read

Updated: 4 days ago

The Original Idea

Hi,

When I started, the plan was simple: an album of songs inspired by Shackleton’s incredible survival story. Each track would capture a moment, an emotion, a feeling, think Dylan, Pink Floyd, Beatles or U2 music and vocals telling the story in its own way.

Discovering Frank Worsley’s Voice

Halfway through, something extraordinary happened. Using modern technology, I could access the real voice of Frank Worsley, captain of the Endurance. Not AI, not an actor, his actual recordings.

Hearing him narrate the story was electric. I realised this project could be more than music. By cleaning and restoring Worsley’s voice, I could bring him back to life, letting him tell the story in his own words.

The last two tracks reflect this shift. Originally, they had layers of music beneath, like a silent-film soundtrack. Stripping that back made Worsley’s voice the centrepiece, poignant, direct, and alive.

I’ve searched extensively and made every attempt to find any copyright on Frank’s voice from nearly 100 years ago. To the best of my knowledge, it is copyright-free, and I have no intention of profiting from it. This project is purely about preserving and sharing history.

Museums & Exhibitions

This approach has sparked interest from museums. The Akaroa Museum in Canterbury, New Zealand, Worsley’s birthplace, is planning to use some of this material.

To support this, I’m trying to make the project copyright-free. Anyone can use it in exhibitions or educational settings. It’s also available on Spotify, Apple Music, YouTube and anywhere you stream music.

What’s Next

I’ve even gone back to the beginning, adding tracks with Worsley narrating the eve of the Great War, the launch of the Endurance, and the first harsh Antarctic winter. The full album will be released in the coming months, finishing this incredible story.

This journey has been full of learning, reading, listening, researching, and reconstructing the timeline. And I couldn’t have done it without my co-producer, Peter Fisher, who’s been with me every step of the way.