Scarborough Fair is a traditional English ballad (Roud 12, Child 2) about a former lover in Scarborough, North Yorkshire, who is asked to perform a series of impossible tasks, such as making a cambric shirt without seam and washing it in a dry well. The refrain references Savory, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme. There is no single original artist; the tune circulated in Yorkshire and Northumbria and was collected in 1947 from Mark Anderson by Ewan MacColl. The best known modern recording is Simon & Garfunkel’s Scarborough Fair/Canticle, released as a single in 1968 and appearing on the 1966 album Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme, with a Canticle counterpoint added to Paul Simon’s lyrics. The song has older connections to The Elfin Knight and The Cambric Shirt and has been covered by many artists, from Martin Carthy in 1965 to Sarah Brightman in 2000.
