You make this sound like a recent move on Robin's part. I'd say he's been at the forefront of the Storytelling Revival in this country since 1980 at least, which is when I first saw him performing solo in a set featuring his now legendary renditions of The Man Who Never had a Dream and Wee Jack & the Old King.

Did anyone get his most recent ECM CD The Iron Stone by the way? A freely improvised redux to many of his earlier works, as the title suggests, and a work of pure sweet & uncompromising genius.

Oh, and the group he had in the late 70s was The Merry Band, featuring as it did a lady harpist whose name presently escapes me...