Because the Bassano family were court musicians Amelia grew up in an intensely musical world which helps explains why the Shakespearean plays are the most musical plays in existence with over 2000 musical references-in some plays one per minute (see Christopher R. Wilson and Michael Calore Music in Shakespeare; A Dictionary, London and New York; Thoemmes Continuum ,2005).

Some of the music in this production of Midsummer was composed by Augustine Bassano for a closely related work, Ben Jonson's Masque of Oberon (1611). In addition VORTEX is specially adapting several of the original Elizabethan songs for this production. You can listen to them here;

Almaine

Our wealth and riches which we enjoyed long
They do appoint their prey and spoil
By cruelty and wrong

To set our houses afire on our heads
And cursedly to cut our throats
As we lie in our beds
Our children’s brains to dash against the ground
And from the earth our memory
For ever to confound