A work song is a piece of music closely connected to a specific form of work, either sung while conducting a task (often to coordinate timing) or a song linked to a task or trade which might be a connected narrative, description, or protest song.

Records of work songs are roughly as old as historical records, and anthropological evidence suggests that all agrarian societies tend to have them. Most modern commentators on work songs have included both songs sung while working as well as songs about work, since the two categories are seen as interconnected. Norm Cohen divided collected work songs into domestic, agricultural or pastoral, sea shanties, African American (gang) worksongs, songs and chants of direction and street cries. Ted Gioia further divided agricultural and pastorals songs into hunting, cultivation and herding songs, and highlighted the industrial or proto-industrial songs of cloth workers, factory workers, seamen, lumberjacks, cowboys and miners. He also added prisoner songs and modern work songs.

Mervyn Edward "Merv" Griffin, Jr. (July 6, 1925 – August 12, 2007) was an American television host, musician, actor, and media mogul. He began his career as a radio and big band singer who went on to appear in movies and on Broadway. From 1965 to 1986 Griffin hosted his own talk show, The Merv Griffin Show on Group W (Westinghouse) Broadcasting. Griffin created the game shows Jeopardy!, Wheel of Fortune, Click, and Merv Griffin's Crosswords with his own "Merv Griffin Enterprises" television production company. During his life Griffin was considered an entertainment business magnate.

Griffin was born into an Irish-American family on July 6, 1925, in San Mateo, California, to Mervyn Edward Griffin, Sr., a stock broker, and Rita Elizabeth Griffin (née Robinson), a homemaker. Raised as a Roman Catholic, Griffin started singing in his church choir as a boy, and by his teens was earning extra money as a church organist. This is one of the reasons he got into show business early; he was considered a piano prodigy. He attended San Mateo High School, class of 1942, and continued to aid in financing the school.

Anna McGarrigle, CM (born December 4, 1944, Montreal, Quebec) is a Canadian folk music singer/songwriter who wrote and performed as a duo with her sister, Kate McGarrigle, until Kate's death in 2010.

In the 1960s, Kate and Anna McGarrigle established themselves in Montreal's burgeoning folk scene while they attended school. From 1963 to 1967, they teamed up with Jack Nissenson and Peter Weldon to form the folk group, the Mountain City Four. Kate and Anna McGarrigle wrote, and recorded and performed music into the twenty first century with assorted accompanying musicians including Chaim Tannenbaum and Joel Zifkin.

McGarrigle is married to journalist Dane Lanken. She and Lanken have two children, Lily and Sylvan Lanken.

Kate and Anna's 1975 self-titled debut album was chosen by Melody Maker as Best Record of the Year. Their albums Matapedia (1996) and The McGarrigle Hour (1998) won Juno Awards. In 1999 Kate and Anna received Women of Originality awards and in 2006 SOCAN Lifetime Achievement awards. In 1993 she was made a Member of the Order of Canada.

Maria Muldaur (born September 12, 1943) is a folk-blues singer who was part of the American folk music revival in the early 1960s. She recorded the 1974 hit song "Midnight at the Oasis," and continues to record albums in the folk traditions.

Muldaur was born Maria Grazia Rosa Domenica D'Amato in Greenwich Village, New York City, where she attended Hunter College High School.

Muldaur began her career in the early 1960s as Maria D'Amato, performing with John Sebastian, David Grisman, and Stefan Grossman as a member of the Even Dozen Jug Band. She then joined Jim Kweskin & His Jug Band as a featured vocalist and occasional violinist. During this time, she was part of the Greenwich Village scene that included Bob Dylan, and some of her recollections of the period, particularly with respect to Dylan, appear in Martin Scorsese's 2005 documentary film, No Direction Home. She married fellow Jug Band member Geoff Muldaur, and after the Kweskin outfit broke up the two of them produced two albums. She began her solo career when their marriage ended in 1972, but retained her married name.

Wayne Alphonso Brady (born June 2, 1972) is an American actor, singer, comedian and television personality, known for his work as a regular on the American version of the improvisational comedy television series Whose Line Is It Anyway?, and as the host of the daytime talk show The Wayne Brady Show. He was the original host of Fox's Don't Forget the Lyrics!, and currently hosts the 2009 revival of Let's Make a Deal.

Brady was born in Columbus, Georgia to West Indian parents, and moved to Orlando, Florida as a young child to live with his grandmother and aunt. When Brady talks about his "Mom," he is referring to his grandmother, Valerie Petersen, who raised him. At 16, he started performing in community theater and at the Orlando improv troupe SAK Comedy Lab where he first started developing his improv skills. He attended Dr. Phillips High School, in Orlando, Florida, where he graduated in 1989. In 1990, he enrolled at the University of Miami. In 1996, he moved to Los Angeles, California, where he continued developing his acting skills.