The original vocal music (the dance music is not extant), in a baroque style, was composed by Henry Lawes, who also played the part of The Attendant Spirit. Generally, masques were not dramas; they could be viewed as pre-figuring the recitative of opera.
In 1745 George Frideric Handel composed three songs and a trio as part of a private arrangement of the masque which was first performed, in June 1745, also at Ludlow Castle.[4]
Scenes from Comus, for vocal soloists and orchestra, is one of the best-known works of composer Hugh Wood (1932–2021) which was commissioned by the BBC and composed between 1962 and 1965. Wood's first orchestral work, it was premiered, in a broadcast from the BBC Proms, in 1965 and provided Wood with a public success.[5][6][7]
