The band's original members were
Norma,
Mike, and Elaine known as
Lal Waterson, with their cousin John Harrison from
Kingston High School. They had a
skiffle band in the early 1960s but moved on to playing more traditional material. They were briefly known as "the Folksons". Their first album was
Frost and Fire 1965, followed by
The Watersons and
A Yorkshire Garland in 1966. The Watersons split up in 1968, when Norma went to work as a disc jockey on a radio station on
Montserrat. The group reformed in 1972, with John Harrison briefly replaced by Bernie Vickers. In that year they performed and arranged the music for the
Alan Plater TV
Play for Today, "The Land of Green Ginger", set and filmed in Hull, and appeared in a scene filmed in the Bluebell Folk Club. Vickers was replaced the same year by Norma's husband,
Martin Carthy. This line-up recorded
For Pence and Spicy Ale (1975),
Sound, Sound Your Instruments of Joy (1977), and
Green Fields (1981). Later line-ups featured Mike Waterson's daughter Rachel Waterson, who briefly replaced Lal during a leave of absence caused by ill health in the mid-1980s, then continued to sing with the group on Lal's return. This five-piece line up performed regularly during the late 1980s and recorded a session for the
BBC Andy Kershaw show in August 1986. In 1987, the group collaborated with
Swan Arcade to form
Blue Murder, who have performed and recorded sporadically with various line-ups to the present day. Subsequent Watersons line-ups fluctuated, featuring
Eliza Carthy, Anne Waterson, Jill Pidd and
Maria Gilhooley at various times, but recording only occasionally. Lal Waterson died in 1998 and, by the early 1990s, Carthy, Norma Waterson and their daughter
Eliza Carthy had formed the group
Waterson–Carthy. The Watersons gradually ceased to sing live on a regular basis, but the family occasionally reconvened for special events and festival appearances, where they are usually billed as "The Waterson Family". These have included '
A Mighty River of Song' at the
Royal Albert Hall on 12 May 2007, the
BBC Electric Proms concert, 'Once in a Blue Moon: A Tribute to Lal Waterson', at
Cecil Sharp House in London on 25 October 2007 and 'A Tribute to Bert,' a concert celebrating the life and work of
Albert Lancaster Lloyd, at Cecil Sharp House on 15 November 2008. During the summer of 2009, "The Waterson Family" performed at a number of festivals and large concerts throughout England and Ireland. Mike Waterson died on 22 June 2011, aged 70, at
Scarborough, North Yorkshire. Norma Waterson died on 30 January 2022, at the age of 82. ==Commendations==