Robert Aytoun of the first Scots to write in standard English. His major work was "Diophantus and Charidora". "Inconstancy Upbraided" is perhaps the best of his short poems. He is credited with a little poem, "Old Long Syne", which probably suggested Robert Burns's famous "Auld Lang Syne". He is also the author of a ballad called "Bothwell" about the battle fought by James Hepburn, 4th Earl of Bothwell with the border reiver, John Elliot of Park, also known as Little Jock Elliot or Little Jock of the Park. The ballad recounts how Bothwell, in attempting to arrest Little Jock Elliot, suffers life-threatening
Avison Ensemble a collection of 18th-century music at the back of a cupboard which was found to be a number of concertos by the long-neglected Avison. Avison wrote more than eighty concertos, which drew the great musicians of the day to perform in Newcastle. He worked with figures such as the astronomer William Herschel who was leader of Avison's orchestra, the composer William Shield (his pupil from Whickham and to whom is owed the memory of Auld Lang Syne), the Newcastle glass enameller Ralph Beilby who was a bass player in Avison's orchestra, and the English wood engraver Thomas Bewick, who as