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
VWL5046 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams and others to the Editor of The Times 19400723 [Tuesday July 23, 1940]
VWL5054 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams and others to the Editor of The Times 19450416 [April 16 1945]
VWL5056 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams and others to the Editor of The Times 19510730 [Monday July 30 1951]
VWL5047 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams and others to the Editor of The Times 19551223 [Friday December 23, 1955]
VWL5068 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams and others to the Editor of The Times 19560327 Tuesday 27 March, 1956
VWL5055 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams and others to the Editor of The Times 19360818 August 18 [1936]
VWL5071 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams and others to the Editor of The Times 19570916 [Monday 16 September, 1957]
VWL5067 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams and others to the Editor of The Times 19561016 16 October, 1956
VWL5045 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams and others to the Editor of The Times 19450111 January 11 [1945]
VWL5044 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams and many others to the Editor of The Times 19381118 18 November [1939]
VWL5069 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams and Geoffrey Bush to the Editor of The Times 19570405 Friday 5 April, 1957
VWL5048 Letter from John Masefield, Ralph Vaughan Williams and members of the National Book League to the Editor of The Times 19551126 [Saturday November 26, 1955]
VWL5049 Letter from Arnold Bax, Ralph Vaughan Williams and others to The Editor of The Times 19460409 [Tuesday April 9, 1946]

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