imitate (A) As a technical term, ‘imitate’ has a specific meaning in music written in parts. It refers to the copying of one part by another in counterpoint and in Elizabethan times was called ‘fuge’. Morley says, ‘we call that a Fuge, when one part beginneth, and the other singeth the same, for some number of notes (which the first did sing)’ (Introduction, 1597, p. 77). In a more general sense it is found in connection with working or composing music from a model, as Morley reminds us when his ‘pupil’ asks: ‘I wil by the grace of God diligentlie observe these rules, therefore I pray you give us some more examples which we may imitate, for how can a workeman worke, who hath had no patterne to instruct him’ (ibid., p. 167).
(B) In her inconsolable despair Lucrece compares herself to Philomela, who vented her distress at Tereus’ rape by singing after being transformed into a nightingale. Lucrece exhorts Philomela to ‘sing of ravishment’ (1128) and then begins to contemplate suicide:
And whiles against a thorn thou bear’st thy part
To keep thy sharp woes waking, wretched I,
To imitate thee well, against my heart
Will fix a sharp knife to affright mine eye,
Who if it wink shall thereon fall and die.
These means, as frets upon an instrument,
Shall tune our heart-strings to true languishment.
(Luc 1135–41)
There is an abundance of musical puns in this and the preceding stanza, most notably the allusion to singing in parts, which gives ‘imitate’ the added sense of a musical echo.
See also compose, point, report.
incantation (A) In a general sense, ‘incantation’ refers to spontaneous or inspirational singing often associated with forms of religious ritual going back to pre-history. More specifically it refers to sung or chanted sets of words – a charm or spell – used to engender a magical effect. The oldness of the spell was thought to give it extra power.
(B) This term is used only once by Shakespeare, when Joan of Arc conjures up some fiends before being captured by the English. She observes that her ‘ancient incantations are too weak’ (1H6 5.3.27). This part of the scene is dominated by Joan’s waning magic powers: as a female practitioner of the occult, she is not given the ability to control her powers to the same extent as her male counterparts in other plays by Shakespeare (Austern, pp. 196–7). There may be a musical nuance in Joan’s reference to ‘incantations’ because of the intimate link between the supernatural (be it good or bad) and music. If the adjective ‘ancient’ is taken to mean ‘of ancient origin’ rather than ‘often-used’, this reinforces Joan’s connection with the world of witchcraft (Burns, p. 261).
(C) Austern, ‘ “Art to Enchant” ’ (1990), on the function of music in magical and supernatural dramatic contexts.
Burns, King Henry VI, Part I (2000).
Gouk, Music, Science and Natural Magic in Seventeenth-Century England (1999).
Walker, Spiritual and Demonic Magic from Ficino to Campanella (1958), on music and magic.
instrument (A) In a musical context, the generic term ‘instrument’ signifies the object used to make music in contrast to the human voice which sings. It is appropriate, therefore, to refer to instrumental music as opposed to vocal music. The two come together when instruments are used to accompany singing.
The sixteenth century had for long been regarded by musicologists as essentially a period of vocal music with instrumental music a subsidiary genre, taking second place a long way behind vocal polyphony and solo song. The importance of instruments in the early modern period, however, should not be underestimated. It is a mistake to regard them as vocal substitutes. Whilst there is a substantial repertoire of sixteenth-century music suitable for either voices or instruments, many kinds of instrumental music clearly showed an independence and idiomatic approach quite distinct from vocal music.
Although the physical shape and sound of every instrument of the Renaissance was separately identifiable, most instruments were grouped into families or consorts (e.g. viols, violins, recorders, shawms, etc.). Reference, therefore, to a recorder or a viol, for example, could mean either a specific type of recorder or viol, or simply any member of the recorder or viol family. Moreover, certain instruments were known by several names (e.g. recorder, flute, pipe, etc); alternatively, one name (e.g. fiddle) could indicate a number of different instruments. Hence, alluding to ‘instrument’ could imply either a specific type or an unidentified type.
In addition to iconographic evidence, many instruments of the period actually survive in differing states of preservation. It is possible, therefore, to know what these instruments looked like (taking care to identify later additions or alterations) and how they might have sounded. Towards the end of the twentieth century, a huge revival in interest in early musical instruments resulted in many being copied in modern reproductions and playing techniques restored and refined.
It is often not possible to know precisely which instruments were employed in instrumental cues in plays and masques but certain conventions governing usage and consort combinations allow us to make informed decisions. ‘Still music’, for example, may indicate soft instrumental music. A viol consort would be more appropriate than a shawm band. ‘Loud music’ signifies noisy wind instruments.
(B) There is only one stage direction in the Shakespeare canon requiring unspecified ‘instruments’: ‘Here is heard a sudden twang of instruments, and the rose falls from the tree’ (TNK 5.1.168.SD). ‘Twang’ suggests that (plucked) stringed instruments would have been employed in contrast to the ‘still music of records’ (136.SD) earlier in this scene full of supernatural omens and involving a number of spectacular effects.
In the dialogue, ‘twangling instruments’ are mentioned by Caliban among the noises which fill the island (Tmp 3.2.137). Elsewhere, Rosalind chides Silvius, who is in love with Phebe: ‘Wilt thou love such a woman? What, to make thee / an instrument, and play false strains upon thee? (AYLI 4.3.67–8). Rosalind is implying that Silvius is letting Phebe exert too much power over him (at line 70 she calls him a ‘tame snake’): that this is an undesirable situation is clear when he is told that false strains are being played on him. This choice of words conveys the idea that tension and power games are intrinsic in love relationships, and that these result in one party being weaker than the other.
A similar tension emerges in Hamlet, when the protagonist expresses his distrust for Rosencrantz and Guildenstern:
Why, look you now, how unworthy a thing
you make of me! You would play upon me, you would
seem to know my stops, you would pluck out the
heart of my mystery, you would sound me from my
lowest note to the top of my compass; and there is
much music, excellent voice, in this little organ, yet
cannot you make it speak. ’Sblood, do you think I am
easier to be play’d on than a pipe? Call me what
instrument you will, though you fret me, yet you
cannot play upon me.
(3.2.363–72)
The ‘little organ’ (367) is a recorder which Hamlet is holding in his hands, unsuccessfully trying to make Guildenstern play it. ‘Fret’ (371) has a similar effect here to ‘strain’ in As You Like It. Its musical nuance overlaps with other meanings of the word, including ‘irritate’, ‘consume’ and ‘devour’. Harold Jenkins has noted that ‘Hamlet switches from wind to stringed instrument for the sake of the pun on “fret” ’ (p. 309). But he seems to disregard the fact that this word appears in a context where Hamlet mentions different playing techniques (playing on the stops, plucking and fretting) to express his discomfort at the idea of being manipulated. The Prince’s speech concludes with a clear provocation: ‘Call me what / instrument you will, though you / fret me, you cannot play upon me’ (370–2). In other words, no matter how his two ‘friends’ and the Danish court label the Prince, he will not let them control him.
The Taming of the Shrew is the Shakespeare play with the largest number of references to ‘instrument’. Hortensio’s disguise as a lute teacher (a trick which allows him to approach and woo Bianca) provokes a series of bawdy innuendos, as in the lively exchanges between Hortensio, Lucentio (himself disguised as a schoolmaster) and Bianca in 3.1. The girl exhorts Hortensio to play his ‘instrument’ (25) while she listens to Lucentio’s lecture.
BIANCA: His lecture will be done ere you have tun’d.
HORTENSIO: You’ll leave his lecture when I am in tune?
LUCENTIO: That will be never, tune your instrument.
. . .
HORTENSIO: Madam, my instrument’s in tune.
BIANCA: Let’s hear. O fie, the treble jars.
LUCENTIO: Spit in the hole, man, and tune again.
(3.1.23–25; 38–40)
Commentators have been inclined to think that these references are strictly musical – when it was difficult to tune the lute, spitting in the treble peg-hole (e.g. Morris, p. 220) would facilitate this process. However, the sexual undertones of these passages are equally strong: the desire of both men to have intercourse with Bianca transpires from their references to the penis (the ‘instrument’ waiting to be tuned). The expression ‘spit in the hole’ is equally interesting as it refers to male orgasm during intercourse. ‘Spit’ refers to seminal emission (Williams, vol. 2, p. 1288), and ‘hole’ is a shape-metaphor for female genitalia (Partridge, pp. 155, 243). Later, Hortensio explains to Bianca that he must teach her the musical scale: ‘before you touch the instrument / to learn the order of my fingering’ (3.1.64–5). Once again, the bawdy tone of these lines is clear: the technique of fingering a wind instrument is here superimposed to the erotic image of masturbation.
In a more serious context, Northumberland reports Gaunt’s death to King Richard: ‘His tongue is now a stringless instrument, / Words, life, and all, old Lancaster hath spent’ (R2 2.1.149–50). The idea of death is conveyed through the image of an instrument deprived of its strings and therefore incapable of producing any sound.
(C) Baines, The Oxford Companion to Musical Instruments (1992).
Jenkins, Hamlet (1982).
Morris, The Taming of the Shrew (1981).
Partridge, Shakespeare’s Bawdy (1968).
Williams, A Dictionary of Sexual Language (1994).