note, then perhaps two notes at once, higher up in the scale, the player relying on the hearer to piece the harmony together.
An entirely different explanation is that of Mr Chappell (in Aldis Wright's Clarendon Press Edition of Henry V.), viz., that when a 'consort' of viols was imperfect, i.e., if one of the players was absent, and an instrument of another kind, e.g., a flute, was substituted, the music was thus said to be 'broken.' Cf. Matt. Locke's 'Compositions for Broken and Whole Consorts,' 1672.
[Mr Aldis Wright has given me references to Bacon's Sylva Sylvarum, III., 278, and Essay of Masque and Triumph, which show that 'Broken Music' was understood to mean any combination of instruments of different kinds. In Sylva Sylvarum Bacon mentions several 'consorts of Instruments' which agree well together, e.g., 'the Irish Harp and Base-Viol agree well: the Recorder and Stringed Music agree well: Organs and the Voice agree well, etc. But the Virginals and the Lute … agree not so well.' All these, and similar combinations, seem to have been described as 'Broken Music.']
In point, see Hen. V. 52, 248, where Henry proposes to Katherine.
