SHAKESPEARE: master of the English language – less well known for his musical numbers.

A young Oxford songwriter has made it into the finals of a national contest to write songs to Shakespeare’s words.

Matt Winkworth, who last year won funding to write his first musical in another national competition, beat hundreds of hopefuls to make the final seven in the Royal Shakespeare Company’s Shakespeare Song Competition.

He wrote music to go with a song from The Tempest called Full Fathom Five, sung in the original by a fairy called Ariel.

He asked Abingdon schoolgirl Bethan Rose, currently studying for her A-Levels at St Helen and St Katharine School, to sing on the recording.

The winning song will be performed at the RSC’s 2015 birthday celebrations in the bard’s hometown of Stratfordupon-Avon over the weekend of April 25.

The winner is decided by a public vote, and voting ends on Thursday so Mr Winkworth, 30, asked for Oxford Mail readers to lend their support.

The Freelands Road resident said: “I don’t know The Tempest well but the lyrics spoke to me.

“It is quite morbid but there’s this idea of life coming out of death in the very literal sense.

“It is quite nice, the idea that out of this rotting corpse these corals and pearls grow, there’s something quite profound about life carrying on in that little verse.”

He added: “It is nice writing to a specific brief, I had not set any Shakespeare words before.”

The song is full of clever musical devices which reflect the lyrics and themes: in a nod to the title, part of the song in a 5/4 time signature.

He also used the sustain medal to give the song a “murky” underwater sound, and using a descending melody to give a sinking feeling.

As to whether the clever tricks will mean anything to the voting public is yet to be seen.

Bethan, who sings Shakespeare’s original words on the track, said she thought the nuances would grab people’s attention.

The 18-year-old mezzo from North Abingdon, also a Grade Eight on the violin, said: “It’s a very haunting, I think that might capture people’s interest.”

She said the changing time signature presented an extra challenge, but good experience for her conditional offer of a place to study music at Oxford.

THE LYRICS

Full fathom five thy father lies;

Of his bones are coral made;

Those are pearls that were his eyes:

Nothing of him that doth fade,

But doth suffer a sea-change

Into something rich and strange.

Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell:

Ding-dong.

Hark! now I hear them – Ding-dong, bell.