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
VWL5072 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to the Editor of The Times 19560702 [Monday 2 July, 1956]
VWL5073 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to the Editor of The Times 19571001 [Friday 4 October, 1957]
VWL2693 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to the Editor of The Times 19530618 18 June 1953
VWL3530 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to the Editor of the Times 19570423 [23 April, 1957]
VWL5075 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to the Editor of The Times 19291209 Dec. 9, 1929
VWL5103 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to the Editor of The Times 19551116 Wednesday 16 November, 1955
VWL1966 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to the Editor of The Times 19500104 January 4 [1950]
VWL5077 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to the Editor of The Times 19570425 April 25, [1957]
VWL5096 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to the Editor of The Times 19551207 [Wednesday, 7 December, 1955]
VWL5059 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to the Editor of the Musical Times 193504-- [April 1935]
VWL2438 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to the Editor of the Bournemouth Daily Echo. 19520624 [24th June 1952]
VWL3968 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Stanley Bate 19471007 7 Oct 1927
VWL4998 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Stanford Robinson 193-0303 March 3 [early 1930s]
VWL4211 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Sir Ivor Atkins 19380404 April 4 [1938]
VWL1867 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Sir Henry Wood 19440225 Feb 25 [1944]
VWL1909 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Sir Henry Wood 19440329 March 29 [1944]
VWL1328 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Sir Henry Wood 19380623 June 23 [?1938]
VWL4967 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Sir Alexander Kaye Butterworth 19230829 29/8/23
VWL5124 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Serge Koussevitsky 1932---- [1932?]
VWL1985 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Roy Budden 19500322 22nd March, 1950.
VWL3009 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ronald Gurney 195505-- [May 1955]
VWL3008 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ronald Gurney 19550517 May 17th 1955.
VWL2511 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Robert Trevelyan 19471227 December 27 [1947]
VWL1614 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Robert Müller-Hartmann 19411226 [26 December 1941]
VWL3051 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Professor Arthur Hutchings 19481029 October 29 [1948]
VWL4848 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Peter Montgomery 19330220 [late February 1933]
VWL4719 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Percy Pitt 1920---- [1920s?]
VWL3972 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Peggy Glanville-Hicks 19510207 7th February 1951
VWL2221 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Norman Del Mar 19510430 April 30, 1951
VWL4484 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Nancy Evans 19550812 August 12th 1955.

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