The New Scorpion Band
The New Scorpion Band consists used for of Tim Laylock, who is well known in the English folk scene after stints with the Albion Band and the Melstock Band, and for his six solo albums. Besides this he has participated as an actor and theatre musician in various conventional theatres. He's a specialist in songs, traditions and literature of the West Country, and made a cd on Dorset dialect poetry. He wrote plays on West Country themes with additional music. His ideas form the basis for the repertoire of the New Scorpion Band. He plays concertinas, melodeons and tenor horn. We also have Brian Gulland. He's mostly known as a former Gryphon band-member. Gryphon started as a medieval folk(rock) band and evolvedin to a unique psych-folkrock band based upon English traditions. Their second and third albums especially are remarkable documents. After that he worked for a while with the French folkrock band Mallicorne. After some occasional projects he has now joined the New Scorpion Band where he plays harmonium, bassoon, cor anglais, tuba, dulcimer, percussion and sings. Thirdly we have Robin Jeffrey, specialised in historical and traditional plucked instruments. He participated with many groups, like The Consort of Musick, The Scholars. More recently he worked on Monteverdi, Purcell and Handel operas, in some theatre and movie productions. Besides that he founded The Burning Bush, a group who performs Jewish traditional music. He plays English guitar, guitar, banjo, mandolin, laouto, sings. Fourth member is Sharon Lindo, violinist at the Royal College of Music and the Guildhall School of Music. She played in some of the medieval bands with Robin Jeffrey amongst various others (Duffay Collective, Collegium Musicum 90, Chiaroscuro,..), and worked very often as a traditional theatre musician. Here she plays violin and viola, guitar, trombone and sings. Last member of this quintet is Robert White, a multi-instrumentalist with a long list of credits as composer and arranger for film and television, and his work in various conventional theatres. He was asked to play Uilean pipes on recordings of many famous folk musicians (L.McKennit, Ralph McTell,..). Here he plays Northumbrian, Border and Union pipes, cornet, french horn, tuba, whistles, flute, ney, bodhran, percussion and sings.
Private 
The New Scorpion Band : Folksongs and tunes from the British Isles (UK,1998)***° (ex)
For me The New Scorpion Band is the best example for how traditional folk music should be executed. Nothing is just written or performed as superfluous. Many band members have experience in historical knowledge, have experience to create theatre-like transformations of songs, and arrange the songs in a convincing way, with beautiful harmonic vocal arrangements. People who know me know I I complain a lot about traditional folk, because I began to hate all the mediocre examples I've heard. I like music, not specifically folk, but I often had the impression many folk lovers (especially in Belgium) just love folk music, not music. But the New Scorpion Band I am able to enjoy just because of the harmonic performance, and because they know what they’re doing, and they compromise to make each song sound interesting.
Even a few jigs from the Thomas Hardy family collection are perfectly arranged together with bassoon, which makes them work best. There are a few amusing countryside songs, with nice vocal arrangements and joyful energy, like the fisherman’s song “Sailing over the Dogger bank”, or theatre like fantasies with some element of drama in them, like “Heaven’s bar”. They also include a very unusual version of “John Barleycorn” collected by Cecil Sharp from John Stafford of Bishops Sutton in Somerset. It has extraordinary vocal arrangements. I personally very much like the ballad "Blow the Candles out" (also known as "the London Apprentice").
This album of all three is closest to the country side folk traditions. Recommended especially to traditional folk music lovers.
