When I first contemplated writing these articles it seemed to me to be
a very interesting, amusing, and pleasant job indeed. I had seen a
great number of Shakespeare's plays, read some of them, and written or
conducted music for most. All I had to do, I thought, was to jot down
a few notes of what I had heard or read, and out of them make a
readable couple of columns. I began to make the notes, and swiftly it
dawned upon me what an enormous task I had taken on. I found that
nearly every composer, great or small, since Shakespeare's time had
been inspired, directly or indirectly, by our poet. True, Handel
avoided him (I can find no trace of Shakespeare in the opera _Julius
Caesar_), and I don't suppose Bach ever heard of him; but I feel sure
that Beethoven's "Coriolan" Overture owes something to Shakespeare as
well as to von Collin, the direct author of the play. But when the
plays began to be translated and circulated abroad, composers all over
Europe came under his extraordinary influence, and began composing
music to his plays or about characters in them.
No music to the plays by contemporary composers has survived. Most
people associate him with Purcell, Locke, Robert Johnson, Bannister, or
Pelham Humphrey; but all these were born some years after his death,
except Johnson, whose settings of "Where the Bee Sucks" and "Full
Fathom Five" are supposed to be the original; but, as Johnson was only
twelve years old when Shakespeare died, _The Tempest_ must have been
produced without these songs, or Johnson must have been more than
usually {xii} precocious. The _Encyclopaedia Britannica_ definitely
says that Johnson's settings are the original.
There are many theories to account for the singular absence of
contemporary musical settings of Shakespeare's lyrics: a quite possible
one being that he wrote his songs to popular tunes of the day, which
everyone knew and no one troubled to write down and print. Many of our
great revue composers hammer out the tune first and then get some
versifier to write words to it. Anyhow, if one is going to produce
Shakespeare's plays and only use settings composed for the original
productions, one would have very little music; and, as he was always
calling for music, both in his stage directions and from the mouths of
his characters, the performances might please the Stage Society, but
certainly would not have pleased the author.
Musically, there are many ways of producing Shakespeare's plays. One
is the absolutely "correct" method--that is, to play _The Tempest_,
say, with the precocious Johnson's two songs only. Another way, not so
"correct," would be to use the precocious one's two songs, and also use
contemporary music not written originally for the words, but adapted by
the producer. Yet another way is the "broad-minded," and includes any
setting of Shakespeare's words written within a hundred years or so.
This method is still roughly described as Elizabethan, but if you
include yet another hundred years the music is called Shakespearian.
After that you get the Old English Wardour Street variety, and, later
still, the tambourin school. To some people a liberal tambourin part
in two-four time denotes "Old English" music:
[Illustration: fragment of music]
(The same figure on the tambourin with the tinkling bells, is called
"Eastern.")
A quite good method is to use the best of all the written music and
make it into a hotch-potch. This is really a very practical way, and
often gives good results. Finally, {xiii} one takes the whole music
written specially for one play by one composer of any period, and does
it as written, with no addition or alteration: this is an ideal method
very rarely put into practice. Even when commissioning a living
composer, managers try to bring in a favourite number by Arne or Horn,
and, unless the composer is a very strong or a very rich man, his
musical scheme will be broken by some well-known tune not in the least
in the style of the rest of his music.
It is difficult to persuade the average Shakespearian producer that
Shakespeare, Arne, Sir Henry Bishop, and Horn were not great friends
who used to meet daily at the Mermaid Tavern to discuss incidental
music.