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
VWL5046 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams and others to the Editor of The Times 19400723 [Tuesday July 23, 1940]
VWL1490 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ursula Wood 194007-- [Early July 1940]
VWL1491 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ursula Wood 194007-- [July 1940]
VWL1493 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ursula Wood 194007-- [July 1940]
VWL4973 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to the Secretary of the Society for the Protection of Science and Learning 19400624 June 24 1940
VWL1424 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Rachel Fell 19400606 About June 6th [1940]
VWL4040 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Lewis Crow 19400604 June 4 [1940]
VWL1488 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ursula Wood 194006-- [June 1940]
VWL4039 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Lewis Crow 19400529 May 29 [1940]
VWL1421 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ursula Wood 19400522 [May 22 1940]
VWL1415 Letter from Henry Wood to Ralph Vaughan Williams 19400416 April 16th, 1940.
VWL1486 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ursula Wood 194004-- [April 1940]
VWL5258 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Gerald Abraham 19400303 March 3 [1940]
VWL1390 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Fritz Hart 19400225 Feb 25 [1940]
VWL1385 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ernest Newman 19400214 Feb 14 [1940]
VWL1382 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Isidore Schwiller 19400202 Feb 2 [1940]
VWL4100 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Canon Briggs 19400201 Feb 1st [1940]
VWL4436 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Joan Shaw 1940---- [1940?]
VWL4908 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Maud Karpeles 1940---- Thursday [1940]
VWL5144 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Daphne 1940---- [ca 1940]
VWL1507 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Hubert Foss (OUP) 1940---- [1940]
VWL3886 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Grace Williams 194----- Nov 2 [1940s]
VWL1642 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Cedric Glover 19391128 Nov 28 [1939]
VWL3940 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Fiona McCleary 19391120 Nov 20 [1939]
VWL1621 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Elisabeth Lutyens 19391106 Nov 6 [1939]
VWL3885 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Grace Williams 19391028 [late October 1939]
VWL1618 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Sir Adrian Boult (BBC) 19391024 Oct 24 [1939]
VWL1617 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Major Percy S.G. O’Donnell (BBC) 19391019 Oct 19 [1939]
VWL1609 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Director-General (BBC) 19391018 Oct. 18 [1939]
VWL5000 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Adrian Boult 19391015 Oct 15 [1939]

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