Facets of Time

Facets of Time is a dramatic lute-song programme, based around one of the Renaissance’s central fascinations - Old Father Time - with music by John Dowland, John Daniel, Alfonso Ferrabosco, Thomas Morley and Barry Mills all to words by William Shakespeare.

Caught between the scientific and the superstitious, Elizabethan England was deeply fascinated – and often unsettled – by the figure of Old Time. Winged, withered, with scythe in hand, Time was for the Elizabethans a fearful, all-consuming figure and a potent vehicle for many vital themes. In this programme of words and music, we encounter Time’s many forms: in sleep, in music, and in death; as a playful challenge to stubborn lovers; and as the ultimate test of true love.