The Taming of the Shrew (ToS-15)

(CM207: 17 cues) H. J. Oliver in OS (1982) gives the background to the Music Lesson in III i 45-83, DO 101-2 gives the score and relates the now familiar ‘Kiss me, Kate’ which recurs during the play (II i 317, V i 145.V ii 181) to a round à 4 in which this is the last line US-Ws V.a.409 f18. DO101; ; ۞DO ii 8 283
See also T.W. Herbert and T. R. Waldo Musical terms in The Taming of the Shrew: evidence of single authorship. ShQ x (1959) 185-9
act scene line Click here to find out more about suggested song
Induction i 13 Horns sound (B272) N&203
48-49 [Procure me music ready when he wakes, To make a dulcet and a heavenly sound]
71 A trumpet sounds. [Sirrah go see what trumpet ’tis that sounds] (B272) N&200-201
Induction ii 33 [Wilt thou have music?] Music 284
34-35 [Hark, Apollo plays, And twenty cagèd nightingales do sing].
LF2: 1588 JONES ‘Beauty sat bathing’ (broken consort); lute song: facsim BL iii (f 14v) 10; EL ii 6: 2/ WA iii 14/ G57/ GR170-1
56-9 [Daphne roaming through a thorny wood…] DO119-120 ‘When Daphne from fair Phoebus did fly’ melody and 4 verses (191d) 285
I i 0 Flourish {sound trumpets}
36 [Music and poesy use to quicken you]
82-83 [My books and instruments shall be my company, On them to look and practice]
92-93 [I know she taketh most delight in music, instruments, and poetry]
ii 16-17 […I’ll ring it; I’ll try how you can *sol fa, and sing it].
67 [wealth is burden of my wooing dance]
130-2 […offer me disguised… as a schoolmaster Well seen in music]
172 [A fine musician to instruct our mistress]
II i ۞BroS22 suggests using for the music lesson Queen Mary’s *Dumpe (281c) 286
33 [I must dance barefoot on her wedding day]
38 Enter …Lucentio as a schoolmaster in the habit of a *mean man,…with Hortensio {dressed} as a musician…with Biondello…bearing a lute and books
54-57 [And, for an entrance to my entertainment, I do present you with a man of mine, Cunning in music and the mathematics, To instruct her fully in those sciences, Wherof I know she is not ignorant].
80 […freely give to you…cunning in…music and mathematics]
98-99 [toward the education of your daughters, I here bestow a simple instrument]
106-7 [Take you the lute, and you the set of books. You shall go see your pupils presently.]
115 [EVERY DAY I CANNOT COME TO WOO.] alternative title to the ballad 287
‘Joan quoth John’, cf. Jan La Rue, ed. Aspects of Medieval and Renaissance music. NY, 1986 (r1978) 832-855
a) DO208; ۞DO ii 29 i ‘I cannot come every day to woo’ being the last line of the refrain (cf SB p 595 where a related tune is given, based on that of Richard NICHOLSON SB386)
b) DO209 The words recur in the 7th verse of RAVENSCROFT ‘A wooing song of a Yeoman of Kents Sonne’, opening ‘I have a house and land in Kent’ DO 209/ Rm22 (with three other singing parts joining the chorus); ۞Du20/ ۞DO ii 29 ii
c) SB386 ‘Scotch tune’ set to ‘Quoth Joan to John’ as in D’Urfey Pills to purge melancholy ۞YF 11
144-158 [What, will my daughter prove a good musician?/ I think she’ll sooner prove a soldier. Iron may hold with her, but never lutes./ Why then, thou canst not break her to the lute?/ Why no, for she hath broke the lute to me. I did but tell her she mistook her frets, And bowed her hand to teach her fingering. When, with a most impatient devilish spirit, ‘Frets, call you these?’ quoth she; ‘I’ll fume with them’. And with that word she struck me on the head, And through the instrument my pate made way, And there I stood amazed for a while, As on a pillory, looking through the lute, While she did call me rascal fiddler, And twangling jack.] W10 comments on the lute’s significance.
290 [For patience she will prove a second Grissel] DO75-79 ‘Bride’s Good-Morrow. A most patient ballad of patient Grissell’ melody and 13 verses tune SB43; ۞DO ii 3 288 (292)
III i 1-14 [Fiddler, forbe ar. You grow too forward, sir:… / But, wrangling pedant, this Bianca is, The patroness of heavenly harmony…And when in music we have spent an hour, Your lecture shall have leisure for as much./ Preposterous ass, that never read so far To know the cause why music was ordained! Was it not to refresh the mind of man After his studies or his usual pain? Then give me leave to read philosophy, And while I pause, serve in your harmony]
22-5 [Take you your instrument, play you the whiles. His lecture will be done ere you have tuned./ You’ll leave his lecture when I am in tune?/ That will be never. Tune your instrument]. Hortensio tunes his lute
37-38 [Madam, my instrument’s in tune./ Let’ hear. {Hortensio plays}. 289
OS ed. H.J. Oliver ‘A lute lesson’ Drexel MS 5609 f 146
39 [O fie! The treble jars./ Spit in the hole, man, and tune again]. AS (1981) 220 i.e. treble peg-hole. Hortensio tunes his lute again
44 [’tis now in tune./ All but the bass./ The bass is right, ’tis the base knave that jars].
58 [My lessons make no music in three parts].
61-78 [Our fine musician groweth amorous./ Madam, before you touch the instrument To learn the order of my fingering, I must begin with rudiments of art, To teach you *gamut in a briefer sort, More pleasant, pithy, and effectual Than have been taught by any of my trade; And there it is in writing, fairly drawn./ He gives a paper Why, I am past my gamut long ago./ Yet read the gamut of Hortensio./ (reads)Gam-ut I am, the ground of all accord, A–†re–to plead Hortensio’s passion. ‘B–mi–Bianca, take him for thy lord, C–fa, ut–that loves with all affection. D–sol, re–one clef, two notes have I, E–la, mi–show pity, or I die.’ Call you this gamut? Tut, I like it not…] (DLC) †‘re’, ‘the second note of the grave hexachord of the Arezzo scale’ (gamut) ‘A Re masque’ (LM59 f15r, 70r) SA110; Sabol draws attention (SA p. 565) to the sophisticated structural device in measures 32-3 in the treble and 34-6 in the bass (as shown in the second incipit). 290
ii 80-84 ‘Nay, by St. Jamy’ uCM209 ‘Watkin’s ale’ + rSATB (63) 291
121-2 [But what a fool am I to chat with you when I should bid good morrow to my bride…] tune and text DO75-79 ‘The Bride’s good morrow’ ‘A most patient ballad of patient Grissell’; ۞DO ii 3; tune SB43 (288) 292
iii 20 [The quaint musician, amorous Licio]
56 Music plays [Hark, hark, I hear the minstrels play] 293
LF3-4: 1599 HOLBORNE H55 ‘Night watch’ (alman) (233)
IV i 36 ‘JACK, BOY! HO, BOY!’ (alluding to first line of a catch:) 294
a) RAVENSCROFT catch à 4 Rp56/ DO224-5/ G110/ OS236/ N192/ FU236; à 3 N15; ۞DO ii 32
b) G110: RAVENSCROFT ‘Hold thy peace knave’ Rd10 catch à 3 (34 5a)
126-7 [1]. ‘WHERE IS THE LIFE THAT LATE I LED!’ (alluding to ballad fragment) 295
a) uCM208 tune + rSATB (a 2 bar song fragment)
b) LF4/ (B272) ‘Lusty gallant’ (64c)
c) DO451-3 ‘The life that erst thou led’, 8 verses set to ‘Heart’s-ease’ (281b)
131-2 [2]. It was the friar of Orders gray, (song fragment) 296
a) uCM208 popular old tune 1592 ‘The Friar and the nun’) (P 173); ‘A toy’ ۞HeP24 SC iii 29/ SCt vi 10/ RE9 ii/ RE45 viii; rSSA Ez 8;
b) uLF4: 1599 MORLEY La Coranto; (after BYRD French coranto) bcM22 (151c)
c) uDO155-6 based on untitled ROBINSON cittern piece; melody set (4 stanzas); ۞DO i 25; other versions: as ‘The New Medley’ in Trumbull lute book, PI and Playford E84/ Eb26/ CW286-7/ C145-6/ RE9/ SC iii / SCt vi 10/ SB149; rSSA Ez8
ii 100-102 [He’s my father…doth resemble you/ As much as an apple doth an oyster] 297
DO297-300; ۞DO ii 49 ‘The lovely lamentation of a lawyer’s daughter for lack of a husband’ ‘Oyster pie’ melody and 18 verses (source for ‘Haymakers’ ballad’). E (1718 edition).

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