Commercial Versions
The melody was used throughout director Fritz Lang's 1941 film Man Hunt starring Walter Pidgeon, Joan Bennett and George Sanders.
The earliest commercial recording of the ballad was by actor/singers Gordon Heath and Lee Payant, Americans who ran a cafe and nightclub, L'Abbaye, on the Rive Gauche in Paris. They recorded the song on the Elektra album Encores From The Abbaye in 1955. Their version used the melody from Frank Kidson's Collection Of Traditional Tunes, published in 1891, which reported it as being "as sung in Whitby streets twenty or thirty years ago" - that is, in about the 1860s.
The song was also included on A. L. Lloyd's 1955 album The English And Scottish Popular Ballads, using Kidson's melody, but the version using the melody later developed by Simon & Garfunkel in "Scarborough Fair/Canticle" was first recorded on a 1956 album, English Folk Songs, by Audrey Coppard. It was included by Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger on The Singing Island, and then by Shirley Collins in 1959 on the album False True Lovers. It is likely that both Coppard and Collins learned it from MacColl, who claimed to have collected it "in part" from a Scottish miner. However, according to Alan Lomax, MacColl's source was probably Cecil Sharp's One Hundred English Folk Songs, published in 1916.
The Sergio Mendes and Brasil '66 made the top 20 in 1968 with a jazzy version of the song
The King's Singers have recorded Scarborough Fair at least twice. One version appears on their LP Original Debut Recording from 1971 (reissued in 1994). Another version appears on their CD Annie Laurie: Folksongs of the British Isles from 1993.
Progressive rock/metal band Queensrÿche recorded a version, featured on the single Empire (1990)
Laura Wright recorded a version, featured on her album The Last Rose (2011)
Siobhan Owen recorded a version, featured on her album "Storybook Journey" (2012)
The Stone Roses also used the ballad as the basis of their song "Elizabeth My Dear"
Daniel Woodward and John Kelly released their extended version along with music video, making reference to Old English and Renaissance culture (2012)
Celtic Woman performed the song with lead vocals by Hayley Westenra.
Scarborough Fair was the main subject throughout episode 8 of Gunslinger Girl (season 2), "A Day in the Life of Claes". In the episode, Claes is shown carrying and reading The Elfin Knight. The ending theme, following the melody and lyrics of Simon & Garfunkel's popularized version, was sung by Aoi Tada.
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