"Allison Gross" (also known as Alison Cross) is a traditional ballad which is included in F.J. Child's The English and Scottish Popular Ballads (#35). It is included in Richard Pearse's Ballads Weird and Wonderful (1912) and in the Roud Index of Folk Songs (#3212). The text originally appeared in Jamieson's Popular Ballads & Songs 2 (1806). It was collected from Mrs. Anna Brown, of Falkland, Aberdeen, in 1792-1794; the only known collection from oral tradition. The thwarted supernatural lover (nereid, fairy, elf, or troll) taking this form of revenge is a common motif in folk tales; the tales are generally a variant on "Beauty and the Beast", where the victim must live in a changed form until some more powerful magic reverses the spell. The transformation back being performed by the Queen of the Fairies, however, is somewhat unique. It was recorded by Ewan McColl and other less well known singers. Steeleye Span performed it to an electronic rock setting and I learned it from them. The tune shown here is the one used by Steeleye Span for the verses. They added a chorus and repeated a modified first verse as an additional chorus every few verses. The lyrics shown here are adapted from the Scottish original by translating some of the Scottish dialect to English.