A key symbol in the text, music has a dual aspect. When played in its rightful context, music represents harmony, divine grace, and love. However, in the wrong context, music is associated with cacophony and the corruption of family ties. 

In its first sense, music is associated with the sweet singing of Marina. Gower describes Marina’s singing to the lute as so exquisite that “She sung, and made the night-bird mute” (V.Chor.26). The song of chaste and virtuous Marina carries such power that it converts sinners into good men, as seen in the brothel sequences. Once frequenters of pleasure-houses, the customers converted by Marina now only want to hear “the vestals sing” (IV.5.7), with vestals referring to the virgin priestesses of the Roman goddess Vesta or, in the Christian context, virginal nuns. 

It is also Marina’s singing that first awakens Pericles from his spiritual stasis. Heavenly music also floods Pericles’s ears when he faints to receive Diana’s vision. Both in the case of Marina and Diana, music is associated with purity, Diana being the virgin goddess of the hunt. Music is also instrumental in awakening Thaisa from her deep sleep, as Cerimon bids that music be played as he uses potions on the queen. He thus implores the music to rouse Thaisa: “The music there! I pray you give her air” (III.2.91).

In its negative aspect, music is associated with the breakdown of chastity. An example of this symbolism is seen in Act I, when Pericles describes Antiochus’s daughter as a “fair viol” (I.1.81) or a beautiful instrument, which would ideally have been touched by a husband to make “lawful music” (I.1.82). However, the instrument has been corrupted because it has been played unlawfully and before its time. The phrase “lawful music” is significant, as it establishes that music or physical love is beautiful within the structure of lawful marriage. Without this rightful structure, music—i.e., sex—becomes corruption.