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
VWL105 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ralph Wedgwood 1901---- [1901?]
VWL106 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ralph Wedgwood 190204-- [April 1902?]
VWL107 Letter from Adeline Vaughan Williams to Ralph Wedgwood 19011227 December 27th [1901]
VWL111 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Gustav Holst 1901---- [1901?]
VWL128 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Gustav Holst 190012-- [?About December 1900]
VWL153 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ralph Wedgwood 190708-- [?Summer 1907]
VWL154 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ralph Wedgwood 190710-- ?October 1907]
VWL176 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ralph Wedgwood 1903120- [Early December 1903]
VWL201 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ralph Wedgwood 189802-- [February 1898]
VWL204 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ralph Wedgwood 19090320 [20th March 1909]
VWL207 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ralph Wedgwood 19060806 [6th August 1906]
VWL210 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ralph Wedgwood 19061005 [5th October 1906]
VWL254 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ralph Wedgwood 189709-- [September 1897]
VWL260 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ralph Wedgwood 189805-- [May or June 1898]
VWL261 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ralph Wedgwood 189905-- [May 1899]
VWL263 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ralph Wedgwood 189906-- [June 1899]
VWL346 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ralph Wedgwood 19140214 [14th February 1914]
VWL355 Letter from Adeline Vaughan Williams to Cordelia Curle 19220614 June 14th [1922]
VWL454 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to the Handel Society 19191107 7/11/19
VWL486 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William Rothenstein 192001-- [?January 1920]
VWL501 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Percy Scholes 19220713 July 13 [1922]
VWL565 Letter from Crompton Llewellyn Davies to Ralph Vaughan Williams 19240715 15 July l924
VWL799 Letter from Archibald Davison to Joan Western 19350926 26.9.35
VWL947 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Imogen Holst 19360519 [19th May 1936]
VWL990 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Elizabeth Trevelyan 19320914 [14 September 1932]
VWL992 Letter from Adeline Vaughan Williams to Diana Awdry 19320101 Jan 1 [1932]
VWL1363 Letter from Honorine Williamson to Ralph Vaughan Williams 19380717 Sunday [17 July 1938]
VWL1624 Letter from R.O.Morris to Alice Sumsion 19420103 Jan 3 1942
VWL1780 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ralph Wedgwood 194704-- [?Spring 1947]
VWL1835 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Robert Trevelyan 19441226 Dec 26 [1944]

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