William Shakespeare

As the celebrated playwright’s birthplace, Stratford-upon-avon is an important literary location. But the bard wasn’t just an advocate for words: Professor Christopher Wilson at the University of Birmingham has identified more than 2,000 references to music, over 400 separate musical terms and around 100 songs within Shakespeare’s plays. The variety and range of references reveal the importance of music in Elizabethan England. In Twelfth Night, the Duke calls: ‘If music be the food of love, play on; Give me excess of it, that, surfeiting, The appetite may sicken, and so die.’