Award-Winning Composer Anne-Marie Keane Leaves Dry Land Behind, Turning Ocean Waves Into Music

Classical composer and pianist Anne-Marie Keane is taking her creativity to uncharted waters, literally. The Berklee-trained artist and mother of three has embarked on a bold, multi-year sailing expedition around the globe aboard her 47-foot sailboat, Alpenglow. With her husband and a small crew by her side, Keane is charting new territory both musically and personally, composing her next body of work from the world’s most remote and unpredictable oceans. As she sails from Spain toward the Caribbean, the South Pacific, and beyond, Anne-Marie Keane is proving that inspiration can be found in motion, even when it rocks at a 30-degree tilt.

For most, the idea of leaving behind the comforts of land to live at sea sounds daunting, but for Keane, it felt like destiny. Just three weeks ago, she and her husband set sail from Barcelona, Spain, marking the beginning of a two-plus-year voyage that will span continents and oceans.

“I put on dance music and danced at the helm while we sailed away,” she told The Blast, recalling the exhilaration of that first morning. “I knew I wouldn’t see that beautiful city, or eat at one of its incredible restaurants, for another two-plus years. But that’s the beauty of sailing: there’s always another port ahead, waiting with new people to meet and local food, wine, history, and culture to explore.”

The couple’s route is as ambitious as it is inspiring, from the Spanish coast to the Caribbean, through the Panama Canal, across the Galápagos, and into the South Pacific, with stops in Australia, South Africa, and Brazil before returning home. For Keane, each destination is both a challenge and a muse, offering new rhythms, textures, and sounds that will inevitably find their way into her compositions.

While many composers rely on the stability of a studio, Keane’s creative workspace moves with the tide. Her “studio," a compact keyboard, headphones, and a laptop, sits at the navigation desk of Alpenglow. It’s there, between shifts at the helm and moments of calm, that she writes the melodies inspired by the sea.

“As long as the conditions aren’t too rough for my stomach or my keyboard, there’s plenty of time to compose while sailing,” she said. With a four-person crew rotating watches, Keane estimates she’ll be on duty about a quarter of the time. “The other eighteen hours, I can either write music or sleep.”

Surprisingly, she finds the ocean’s solitude more conducive to composing than being in port. “Before any long voyage, there’s a lot of preparation, provisioning, cooking, repairs,” she explained. “Once we’re underway, life becomes simpler and quieter.”

Nature itself often serves as her greatest collaborator. Keane records the sounds of the sea, including the slap of water against the hull, the ring of a buoy bell, even the clang of metal on deck, and blends them into her music. “I even made percussion sounds by striking different boat surfaces with a wooden spoon and a metal rod,” she laughed.

Beyond her artistry, Keane is a vocal advocate for women’s empowerment in the arts and politics. Through her work with Vail Women Elect, she’s helped raise more than $760,000 to support female candidates, while also mentoring young composers through the Very Young Composers Program.

“Our country is going backwards by restricting and limiting women’s rights,” she said passionately. “The gains our mothers and grandmothers fought for, like birth control and safe abortion, are being rolled back by a vocal minority. If we don’t want that to happen, the majority must speak up and make sure our voices are heard, whether in the arts, politics, or business.”

Her activism, she says, is inseparable from her creative work. “Half the world’s population is female, yet women remain underrepresented in business, politics, and the arts," Keane told The Blast. "To reach our full potential, we must support and advocate for one another.”

As a mentor, Keane encourages aspiring artists, especially young girls, to master both creativity and technology. “Learn piano or keyboard, become fluent in digital audio workstations, and find collaborators,” she advised. “Create with purpose… and a deadline.”

Keane’s journey isn’t just about adventure, but she says it’s about living intentionally. Her life philosophy, shaped by tragedy, fuels everything she does. “At 19, I survived a car accident that killed one of my friends,” she shared. “It taught me that I don’t know when or how I’ll die, so I better live now. I want to leave the humans on this planet a little better off than when I arrived.”

That mindset is what propels her to take bold risks, like crossing the Atlantic, while maintaining grace under pressure. Whether she’s composing in calm seas or bracing against 40-knot winds, Keane’s mission is to create music that mirrors the ebb and flow of life itself.

Every voyage deserves its theme song, and for Keane, it’s Hans Zimmer’s "Pirates of the Caribbean" score. “It always grounds me at sea,” she said with a smile. But if her own journey were a film, she already knows the title: "Song of the Sea."

That title feels fitting, not just for the music she’s creating, but for the life she’s chosen to live: one filled with courage, rhythm, and unshakable purpose. As her sails carry her from continent to continent, Anne-Marie Keane continues to remind us all that art isn’t confined to four walls. Sometimes, it’s written between waves.