g._, _Hautboys_, which is
found about 14 times.
Here are a few relics of Stage Music before Shakespeare's day.
The playing of the minstrels is frequently mentioned in the old
Miracle Plays, and the instruments used were the horn, pipe, tabret,
and flute. In the Prologue to the Miracle Play, Childermas Day, 1512,
the minstrels are requested to 'do their diligence,' and at the end of
the Play to 'geve us a daunce.'
In Richard Edwards's _Damon and Pithias_ [Transcriber's Note:
'Pithias' is correct for the title of this play], acted in 1565,
there is a stage direction. "Here Pythias sings and the regalles
play." Also, when Pythias is carried to prison, "the regalls play a
mourning song." Thus the Regal, a tiny organ that could be easily
carried about, was considered a proper instrument for the stage. In
the old Comedy, Gammer Gurton's Needle, 1566, mention is made by one
of the characters of the music between the acts--
"Into the town will I, my friendes to visit there,
And hither straight again to see the end of this gere;
_In the meantime, fellowes, pype up your fidles_: I say take them,
And let your friends hear such mirth as ye can make them."
In Gascoyne's _Jocasta_, 1566, each act is preceded by a dumb show,
accompanied by "viols, cythren, bandores, flutes, cornets, trumpets,
drums, fifes, and still-pipes." In Anthony Munday's comedy _The Two
Italian Gentlemen_ (about 1584), the different kinds of music to be
played after each act are mentioned--_e.
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