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.

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Letter No. Title Date Date on Letter
VWL3282 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Frank Thistleton 19580626 June 26th 1958.
VWL2716 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Elizabeth Trevelyan 19530912 Sept 12th, 53
VWL2752 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Elizabeth Trevelyan 19540110 January 10th 1954
VWL3443 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Edmund Rubbra 19561025 October 25th 1956.
VWL3660 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Cordelia Curle 19540924 Sept 24th [1954]
VWL3281 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Cedric Glover 19580627 June 27th 1958.
VWL4289 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Brian Trowell 19560304 Sunday [4 March 1956].
VWL2862 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Beryl Lock 19540822 August 22nd 1954
VWL3987 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Alexander Burnard 19531226 December 26th 1953
VWL3094 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Albert Sturgess 19550609 June 9th 1955.
VWL3181 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Alan Frank (OUP) 19550814 August 14th 1955.
VWL3364 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Alan Frank (OUP) 19560818 August 18th 1956.
VWL3351 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Alan Frank (OUP) 19560708 July 8th 1956.
VWL3442 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Alan Frank (OUP) 19561025 October 25th 1956.
VWL3376 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Alan Frank (OUP) 19580209 February 9th 1958.
VWL2699 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Alan Frank (OUP) 19530628 June 28th 1953.
VWL3768 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Alan Bush 19561204 December 4th 1956.
VWL3412 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Adrian Boult 19560602 June 2nd 1956.
VWL3571 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Adrian Boult 19571001 Oct 1st 1957
VWL3552 Letter from Michael and Eslyn Kennedy to Ralph Vaughan Williams 19571231 Dec.31, 1957.
VWL3714 Letter from Margot Fonteyn to Vaughan Williams Memorial subscribers 195903-- March, 1959
VWL3570 Letter from John Barbirolli to Ralph Vaughan Williams 19571001 [Early October 1957]
VWL4680 Letter from Adeline Vaughan Williams to Cordelia Curle 19461107 Thursday [7.11.46]

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