Essay: Explore the Use of Music and Wind Instruments in Shakespeare’s 'Hamlet'

Other than the trumpet mentioned in stage directions, there is also an allusion to recorders, which is another type of wind instrument, serving as the flute of that time. When Hamlet is talking to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, he sees players enter with recorders. He insists on Guildenstern trying to play the recorder. After Guildenstern tells him that he is not able to play the instrument, Hamlet remarks that “It is easy as lying” and that he just needed to “Govern these ventages with [his] fingers and thumb, give it breath with [his] mouth, and it will discourse most eloquent music” (3.2.330-332). Seeing this, the audience can make tentative guesses and give this incident an application personal to Shakespeare. It is highly possible that he himself has used the recorder of a musician in the theatre and tried playing it for fun. The recorder serves as an extended metaphor. When Guildenstern refuses to play the recorder again by saying that it is hard for him to play out a melody, Hamlet demands him with anger: “’Sblood, do you think I am easier to be played on than a pipe? Call me what instrument you will, though you can fret me, yet you cannot play upon me” (3.2.341-344). The reason for Hamlet’s rage is that he discovers that his friends are sent by the king and queen to monitor him. He feels betrayed; therefore, he compares himself with a recorder, warning Guildenstern and Rosencrantz that he is much harder to be played, or in another word, tricked than a recorder. He is telling them that he knows what they are told to do and that they should stop treating him as a mad person or a fool and just leave him alone. This extended metaphor undoubtedly contains a certain degree of sarcasm, which reflects the helpless situation of Hamlet. People all think that Hamlet is mad and that they can play tricks on him as easily as playing a recorder. What they do not yet know is that he is experiencing extreme rage and grief over the truth of his father’s death, which is in fact due to Claudius, who has killed Hamlet’s father for the throne.
Other than the presence of instruments, there are also songs that are presented to the audience, which are similar to those in As You Like It. A key role of music in this tragedy is that it is closely related to the theme of madness (Scholes 5). When Ophelia learns that her father has died, she has fallen into a state of madness. She enters the stage singing songs and is unable to communicate with others. She sings about her father “dead and gone…At his head a grass-green turf, / At his heels a stone” (4.5.28-31). It is evident to the audience that Ophelia is lamenting about the death of her father, showing extreme grief towards this sudden change in her life. Her mental breakdown is clearly shown through the songs because there seems to be no connection at all between the verses, making the song disjointed. She, in a state of madness, seems to be living in an entirely different world that she created by herself. Ophelia, as a woman at that time, seems unable to make decisions by herself. It is always the male characters around her that are telling her how to behave. Moreover, different characters see Ophelia differently. In her father’s eyes, she is supposed to remain innocent and naive, staying away from Hamlet. However, in Hamlet’s eyes, he sees her as his lover, something to symbolise his manhood. Ophelia is caught between these two views of herself and is facing the conflict constantly. She is forced to be unkind to Hamlet, yet she is deeply in love with him. This conflict is also a factor that drives Ophelia mad since she goes on singing about a poor girl who is tricked into having an affair with a man who then refused to marry her: “Quoth she, ‘Before you tumbled me, / You promised me to wed.’ / He answers, / ‘So would I ha’ done, by yonder sun, / An thou hadst not come to my bed’” (4.5.61-65). This rather strange song implies that even in a state of madness, Ophelia is still caught in between two contrasting expectations on her. This highlights the fact that just like the young girl in the song, Ophelia is betrayed by the men around her, especially Hamlet who murdered her father. Thus, Ophelia concludes that all men are bad and untrustworthy. Evidently, music is intertwined with madness, depicting a sense that only through music can a person, whose spirit is in another world, communicate with people in reality. Her songs are filled with emotion and through those lyrics the audience can truly sense her sorrow and her suppressed rage towards society.