The Double Dealer was one of two collaborations between Henry Purcell and William Congreve. At the time he wrote it, Congreve wasn't quite comfortable writing plays with music in them, however the suite of instrumental music which Purcell composed for the play greatly enhances it. The only song which exists from the play by Purcell is called "Cynthia Frowns" and was in part a commentary on the many duplicitous and adulterous characters in the plot. The text illustrates the triviality of the "game" of love, and is sung by passersby to the only two innocent characters in the play. Of course it offends them, and they move on, but in so offending them the song helps create a dramatic moment of great irony.

The overture to this play is majestic and exhibits plenty of French influence. There are two sections. The opening is in Andante maestoso and filled with suspensions and imitation. Purcell composed the first part using a limited amount of rhythmic material, creating a great sense of rhythmic unity throughout. He creates tension by having the inner two voices play together against the soprano and bass which play imitatively against one another. The second movement is in three and employs all dotted rhythms and nervous arpeggiated figures. Again the fabric is densely imitative and filled with suspensions and syncopation. Purcell breaks into a more homorhythmic style before returning to energized counterpoint. This overture also has a short coda. Marked piu lento, it closes the work in suspension filled harmonies.

The rest of the suite consists of several varieties of dance movements. The first is a hornpipe in a vivace triple time. A continually moving bass line characterizes this piece, as well as displaced beats in the bar. This is followed by an Adagio Air filled with dotted rhythms and another Hornpipe permeated with the discord of the deviousness of the characters in the play. There are four other dance movements, all of the highest quality; two Airs, and two delightful minuets.

The only song to the play, "Cynthia Frowns" is incredibly difficult and obviously meant for a professional singer. At the time, Purcell was collaborating with Eccles, whose music also was very popular, in part because he could write simple songs easy enough for the actors to sing. The stage director didn't have to introduce operatic singers into the dramatic action if an Eccles song needed to be sung, and often the actors and actresses would do quite well with the songs they had to sing. They could give them dramatic potency, and be as extroverted as liked with them. There was probably some rivalry between Purcell, who obviously admired continental Italian operatic styles and Eccles, who could write pieces suited for the performers at hand.

"Cynthia Frowns" is given to a high voice, and is full of angularity and almost sexual harmonies and ornamentation. Sex is implicated in the text of the song, as it is about one rake's attempted wooing of a girl named Cynthia. The music also almost seems a bit taunting, at times. Purcell plays major and minor tonalities against one another, and makes use of word repetition and melismatic ornamentation to set his text. It has two verses, but the music is through)composed. In the second half there are flirtatious, lilting leaps that double back and wind around themselves in every bit as elastic a manner as any Purcell recitative. The final line, "To be past yet with fruition", a phrase that exclaims against having let the best of life go by, is set to a soaring, lyrical line to end the song.

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