Shakespeare is referring to a "minstrel".
In the late sixteenth and seventeen century in England (and I suspect
elsewhere) there were several "classes" of musicians. On the scale of
respectability, "minstrel" would be relatively low.
At the top were the Court musicians and members of the Chapel Royal
and collegiate churches and chapels ("collegiate" meaning the
administration was answerable only to the crown, including
institutions such as Westminster Abbey after 1559). These were
followed by domestic musicians of some of the grander households
(such as that of Robert Cecil, etc.). A good description of this is
provided in Walter L. Woodfill, Musicians in English Society from
Elizabeth to Charles I (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1953;
reprinted New York: Da Capo Press, 1969).
Even certain instruments had a "status". At the top of this heap were
the lute and viol. Hence we see many portraits of noble women and
upper class women holding a lute or theorbo as a symbol of their
status (and I suspect a symbol of being educated).
A symptom of the gap between minstrels and court musicians is
glimpsed in the sometimes bitter political warfare between the
Company of Musicians (or "Masters, Wardens and Commonalty of the Art
or Science of the Musicians of London", representing the independent
musicians of London, Westminster, and areas within three miles of
London) and the Corporation of Musicians (representing the Court
Musicians and members of the collegiate churches and chapels - though
part of the fight was over the collegiate chapels). See Woodfill, pp.
3-32. See also H.A.F. Crewdson, A Short History [of] The Worshipful
Company of Musicians (London: Constable, 1950; with booklet: Addenda
and Corrigenda, 1956).
GJC
On 31 Jan 2006 at 9:32, Sean Smith wrote:
> For example, it is not hard to find bawdy Elizabethan music.
> And Shakespeare often refers to musicians as persons of low
> class, eg from "Romeo and Juliet" (paraphrased from memory):
>
> Zounds, do you take me for a minstrel?
> [Draws sword.]
> Here is my fiddlestick, that will make you dance.
>
> How did music so completely escape its low-class association,
> and drama so completely fail?
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