How Shakespeare and his contemporaries used music to rouse emotions

On Thursday, The Conversation explored how Shakespeare and his contemporaries deployed music as an emotional lever on stage. The rhythmic chanting of 'double, double toil and trouble' by Macbeth's witches wasn't mere theatricality—it was calculated to provoke genuine fear in audiences primed to believe in witchcraft. Beyond supernatural effects, characters communicated grief and romantic longing through song, with Hamlet's Ophelia voicing fragmented melodies after her father's death. Early modern audiences understood music as a celestial force: harmonious sound connected to the divine, while discord signaled the demonic. Research into this period, particularly the Caroline era—sixteen twenty-five to sixteen forty-nine—reveals music's gendered dimensions too: female characters could sing onstage to express emotion, but singing men risked derision as effeminate or mad. What's striking is that despite the four centuries between Shakespeare's stage and our playlists, audiences remain attuned to the same emotional levers: sad songs for grief, energizing music for motivation, and calming tunes to quiet our minds.

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