Welcome to the Vaughan Williams Foundation – one of the foremost sources of funding for recent and contemporary music in the UK

The Vaughan Williams Foundation is a grant-giving charity which upholds the values and vision of the celebrated composer Ralph Vaughan Williams and his wife Ursula Vaughan Williams.

Our principal aims are to honour RVW’s desire to support his fellow composers through funding for performances and recordings, and to help make his own work widely accessible to the general public.

VWF was founded in 2022, 150 years after the composer’s birth, and brings together the two charities originally set up by Ralph (RVW Trust) and Ursula (Vaughan Williams Charitable Trust).

THE FOUNDATION

Funding

Vaughan Williams Scholarships

Applications are now open for the 2026 Vaughan Williams Scholarships.
4 scholarships of £8,000 each are awarded annually to postgraduate students of composition.

For more than 40 years Vaughan Williams funding has been awarded to support postgraduate study in composition. The 270 previous recipients have included names such as Julian Anderson, Christian Alexander, Anna Meredith, Graham Fitkin, Larry Goves, Gavin Higgins, Hannah Kendall and Daniel Kidane.

Congratulations to our 2025 Vaughan Williams Scholars: Tom Burkhill, Lucy Holmes, André Faria Serra and Elliott Park.


HOW TO APPLY

Funding

Applications Open

Composers are at the heart of what we do. VWF offers three annual funding rounds towards:

the performance, commission and recording of music by British and Irish composers active in the last 100 years, and/or

work which furthers the knowledge and understanding of the life and work of Ralph Vaughan Williams, and of Ursula Vaughan Williams.

We welcome applications from ensembles, organisations and individuals.

FUNDING OPPORTUNITIES

Our new Trustees

Joining the Board

We are delighted to announce the appointment of Sam Wigglesworth, Harriet Wybor and Raymond Yiu as new Trustees, bringing with them a wealth of experience and a passion for music.

We are so grateful for their commitment to the Foundation and look forward to working with them to develop VWF for the future.

Find out more about the faces behind the VWF and our work.

WHO WE ARE

RVW

Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872-1958) is one of the greatest of British composers whose music, generosity and vision for community music making continue to impact British musical life.


Find out more about the composer and explore our extensive archive of letters and photographs and catalogue of published works.

DISCOVER

READ THE LATEST

Vaughan Williams Foundation

📻 This Sunday on BBC Radio 3, at 7.45pm – the Sunday Feature: Ralph Vaughan Williams and Fenland Music. Robert Macfarlane, Alyson Tapp and Caroline Davison talk to poet Jade Cuttle about the musical inspiration Ralph Vaughan Williams found in the fens.

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Vaughan Williams Foundation

Give yourself a musical treat this weekend and enjoy this 2021 recording of The Oslo Philharmonic, conducted by Vasily Petrenko, performing Ralph Vaughan Williams' Symphony No. 5 in Oslo Concert Hall. 🎧 👇

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Vaughan Williams Foundation

“Your bow has got to seem like it’s endless. The audience must just be aware of a seamless flow of sound.” Musicians and academics examine the power of Vaughan Williams' 1914 masterpiece, The Lark Ascending, inspired by George Meredith’s poem. 🎧 👇

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Vaughan Williams Foundation

Fascinating stuff here from @bachtrack.com, using its listings of more than 31K concert, opera and dance events to provide insight into what orchestras, opera houses and dance companies are offering worldwide. Find the article here: bachtrack.com/classical-mu…

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Vaughan Williams Foundation

An insight from RVW here in a letter to The Times, in response to a critic's comment that a singer had delivered one of his songs "too slowly"

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Vaughan Williams Foundation

A thought for all the singers out there! 🎶

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Vaughan Williams Foundation

A programme produced by the Music Teachers’ Association provides free resources for teaching about various aspects of RVW’s work, from Early Years Foundation Stage through to Key Stage 5. 🎓

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Vaughan Williams Foundation

In the early 19th century, the poet and painter William Blake produced a series of artworks illustrating the biblical book of Job, telling the story of a prosperous man tested. Two movements from Vaughan Williams’s Job – A Masque for Dancing were inspired by his paintings and engravings.

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Vaughan Williams Foundation

The Vaughan Williams Foundation has three deadlines annually for general funding. The next deadlines are: 🎶 Friday, May 1, 2026, (for work taking place from August 2026 onward) 🎶 Thursday, September 3, 2026 🎶 Tuesday, January 5, 2027

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Vaughan Williams Foundation

How about some RVW by candlelight? 🕯️ London Concertante will perform The Lark Ascending, paired with Vivaldi’s Four Seasons, at cathedrals across Ireland and the UK throughout 2026, starting with Rochester Cathedral on March 27. Details and 🎫 via the London Concertante website

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THE LETTERS OF RALPH VAUGHAN WILLIAMS

Featured Letter

Get to know the man and his music

RVW’s wide-ranging correspondence – with family, pupils, fellow composers, conductors and performers – paints an intriguing portrait of the man, as well as providing fascinating insights into his major preoccupations: musical, personal and political.


Our searchable database includes over 5000 annotated transcriptions of his correspondence all available to read online.

BROWSE THE LETTERS

Letter of the Day

Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Grace Williams

Letter No.: VWL3870

From R. Vaughan Williams,
The White Gates,
Westcott Road,
Dorking.

[early 1940s?]

My Dear Grace
It was dear of you to remember me at Xmas – we can only hope for a little more happiness in the new year
Love from
Uncle Ralph

His music continues to inspire us. Its incredible breadth of style and outlook seems especially important in our polarised times.

CHRISTOPHER GLYNN, artistic director, Ryedale Festival

Among his acts were countless kindnesses, known only to himself and the persons concerned. He gave continuous encouragement to younger men. He had the dignified humility of a great man, and was utterly unself-seeking.

SIR ARTHUR BLISS, conductor

I cannot stress enough how important this organisation’s work is, what a profound difference it is making, and how it has enabled so many to develop creatively and give new work a platform. Vaughan Williams himself would surely be so proud of this legacy. 

ZOE MARTLEW, composer and cellist

It is necessary to know facts, but music will enable you to see past facts to the very essence of things in a way which science cannot do. The arts are the means by which we can look through the magic casements and see what lies beyond. 

RVW, letter to the children of Swaffham Primary School, 1958