English comedy from the fifteenth to the early seventeenth century abounds in song lyrics, but most of the original tunes were thought to have been lost—until now. By deducing that playwrights borrowed melodies from songs they already knew, Ross W. Duffin has used the existing English repertory of songs, both popular and composed, to reconstruct hundreds of songs from more than a hundred plays and other stage entertainments.

Thanks to Duffin's incredible breakthrough, these plays have been r...