Original Version

“Catro Vellos Mariñeiros” " is a Galician song that gained great popularity in the second half of the XX Century.

Its composition is attributed to the amateur writer and musician José Travieso Quelle in the early
1940s, in a social gathering of friends who met daily at the tavern "O Sete Velo" located on the street
"A Raíña" in Santiago de Compostela.
It was a group of students and young people of different condition who had fun inventing and
performing melodies, accompanying them with a string instrument.

The young José Travieso collected some of those melodic fragments, arranged them, and put lyrics
inspired by the seafaring work of the fishermen of Viveiro (in the north of Lugo), his hometown.

The song, to the beat of 3⁄4, is usually performed in the key of A Maior.

The melody of the verse is on a chopped rhythmic sequence, possibly inspired by some jumping drum dance of Castilian or Basque-Navarrese origin.
The song's popularity has taken important steps worth mentioning.
A teacher and musician from Compostela destined for Celeiro (a parish of Viveiro), Carlos Adrán
Cambón, performed in Lugo, at the head of the group “Coros e danzas de Celeiro”, in 1952, the song
he had heard so many times in local bars monumental of Santiago.

Some notable versions that were recorded of “Catro Vellos Mariñeiros” were, apart from those of
different choirs from all over Galicia and some Galician centers abroad, that of the duo “María and
Xavier” in the late 1960s, that of the Mugardos singer Xoán Rubia some time later, and, more recently, that of "Escolma de Meus" by Viveiro, the
duo "Liah and Kelly" and that of the groups "A Roda" and "Treixadura".

 Wikipedia  extract & translation .