Search the letters

The Vaughan Williams Foundation has made over 5000 items freely available: chiefly letters from Ralph Vaughan Williams, but including some responses which shed light on the subject matter, and also a number of letters from Adeline and Ursula Vaughan Williams. These provide further information and often include messages or observations from Ralph, and there are also letters from Adeline and Ursula written on behalf of the couple. The text of letters written by RVW and UVW remain the copyright of the Foundation.

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The letters are in tabular form and can be sorted by column, or filtered by any keyword including name, musical title, year or subject (singly or in combination). Partial matches will also be found, e.g. searching “sky” will also find “Stravinsky”. To search for a phrase use inverted commas, e.g. “New York”.

To search by letter number, include the prefix VWL, e.g. VWL123.

Filter letters

Letter No. Title Date Date on Letter
VWL4155 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Alan Frank (OUP) 19511017 17th October, 1951.
VWL5017 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to John Buckland 19511016 Oct 16 [1951]
VWL2279 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Imogen Holst 19511016 Oct 16 [1951]
VWL4042 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Mrs Lewis Crow 19511016 Oct 16 [1952?]
VWL4730 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Arthur Dickinson 19511016 Oct 16 [1951]
VWL2281 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Guthrie Foote (OUP) 19511015 Oct 15 [1951]
VWL2280 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Arnold Barter 19511015 Oct 15 1951
VWL2492 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Katharine Thomson 19511014 Oct 14 [1951]
VWL4354 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Mary and Victor Sheppard 19511012 12th October, 1951.
VWL2277 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to John Barbirolli 19511006 Oct 6 1951
VWL2276 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Roy Douglas 19511003 [3 October 1951]
VWL4154 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Alan Frank (OUP) 19510919 19th September, 1951.
VWL2274 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to John Barbirolli 19510912 12th September, 1951.
VWL2272 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Roy Douglas 19510910 Sept 10 [1951]
VWL2271 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Alice Sumsion 19510831 31st. August, 1951.
VWL4327 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams’s cat to Marjory Jordan 19510829 Aug 29 1951
VWL2268 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Alan Frank (OUP) 19510824 Aug 24 [1951]
VWL3777 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to the Mayor of Colchester 19510808 8 August 1951
VWL3996 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Alexander Burnard 19510808 8 Aug 1951
VWL2265 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Peter Tranchell 19510808 8th August, 1951.
VWL4152 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Alan Frank (OUP) 195108-- Monday [August 1951]
VWL2345 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to John Barbirolli 195108-- [August 1951]
VWL4153 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Alan Frank (OUP) 195108-- [August 1951?]
VWL4151 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Guthrie Foote (OUP) 19510728 July 28 [1951]
VWL5110 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Arnold van Wyk 19510725 25th July, 1951.
VWL2053 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Gilmour Jenkins 19510717 [17 July 1951]
VWL1893 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ralph Wedgwood 19510707 Saturday [?7th July 1951]
VWL5127 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Olga Koussevitsky 19510707 7th July, 1951.
VWL2261 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Roy Douglas 19510701 Sunday [?1 July 1951]
VWL2258 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Hubert Foss 19510624 [24th June 1951]

You have never lost your invention but it has not developed enough.  Your best – your most original and beautiful style or ‘atmosphere’ is an indescribable sort of feeling as if one was listening to very lovely lyrical poetry.

GUSTAV HOLST letter to RVW 1903

He was one of the most 'complete' men I have ever known. He loved life, he loved work and his interest in all music was unquenchable and insatiable.

SIR JOHN BARBIROLLI, conductor

I was thunderstruck by the symphony last night - and hadn't expected to be. Jagged, pulsating and angry, from that very first clanging dissonance - how can it have come from the same source as the Tallis Fantasia?

AUDIENCE MEMBER, Newbury Festival