FOLK big band Bellowhead are to precede their farewell tours with a compilation of the best loved tracks from their five studio albums.

Released on October 16 on Navigator Records, Pandemonium – The Essential Bellowhead will feature 13 tracks selected by the 11 band members, designed to represent high points of their stellar 11-year career.

Crowd favourite New York Girls, from Hedonism, will open the track listing, having been issued as a single in September. Further tracks will be 10,000 Miles Away, Betsy Baker and Roll The Woodpile Down from Broadside; Roll Alabama, Gosport Nancy and Let Her Run off Revival; Fakenham Fair and Whiskey Is The Life Of Man from Matachin; Yarmouth Town and Cold Blows The Wind off Hedonism; Prickle-Eye Bush from E.P.Onymous and Burlesque number London Town.

Bellowhead, who headlined Pocklington's Platform Music & Comedy Festival in July, will undertake two farewell tours, the first next month, the second in April 2016. Only the last few tickets are still available for their Harrogate International Centre show on November 23, when Keston Cobblers Club will be the support act. To book, ring 01423 502116 or visit harrogatetheatre.co.uk

Formed in Oxford in 2004, Bellowhead went on to headline major British and international festivals, sell out prestigious concert halls and notch up in excess of 250,000 album sales. They hold the record for the highest-selling independent traditional album of all time, Hedonism, and the highest-charting independent British album, Broadside.

Bellowhead have won eight BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards and their last studio album, Revival, their 2014 debut for Island Records, entered the UK charts at number 12 and spawned three Radio 2 play-listed singles.

Early in 2015, lead singer Jon Boden decided to step down from the band and the rest of Bellowhead felt they did not want to continue without him.

"The shows always finish on a high, and so should we," they announced.

Their last Yorkshire shows will be at Sheffield City Hall on April 21 and Halifax Victoria Halls on April 25 next spring.