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).
Funding
Vaughan Williams Scholarships
We are pleased to announce that four scholarships of £8,000 each have been awarded to postgraduate students of composition.
Congratulations to our 2026 Vaughan Williams Scholars: Patrick Gorry, Scarlett Henderson, Donnchadh Mac Aodha and Dominic Wright.
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.
Funding
Applications
Since 2023 we have awarded over £1.35 million to composer projects. 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.
Applications will reopen on 1 October 2026. We welcome applications from ensembles, organisations and individuals.
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.
READ THE LATEST
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.
Letter of the Day
Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ursula Wood
Letter No.: VWL1740
[July 1942]
My Dear
I write on this fine note paper out of economy!
I am so thankful your foot is getting better – I could not bear to think of your pretty foot all swollen1 & I was afraid it might develop into something worse. But what a hard time you’ve had – Yes we will meet soon & drown our cares in beer.
I am pleased with the film music2 on the whole – though it was all rather against the collar.3 Of course I will take you to it my dear.
Is dill a sort of feathery plant? If so some of it is coming up.4
Hens do an average of 2 a day which I suppose is all one can expect. Today I’ve been spreading their droppings out in the sun to dry.
I’ve been reading Patmore5 lately in a certain place – v good and each poem takes about the right time.
[No signature]
1. UW had had a broken needle removed from her foot.
2. UVW’s note says The Loves of Joanna Godden (Catalogue of Works 1946/2) but Coastal Command (Catalogue of Works 1942/1) seems more likely for 1942. The film was to receive its premier in October.
3. a ploughing metaphor.
4. See VWL1663.
5. Coventry Patmore, the Victorian poet.
