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
VWL1746 Letter from Ralph Wedgwood to Ralph Vaughan Williams 19430127 27.i.43
VWL5053 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams, T.S. Eliot and others to the Editor of The Times 19490303 [Thursday March 3, 1949]
VWL5052 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams, Myra Hess, Albert Sammons and Lionel Tertis to the Editor of The Times 19470522 [Thursday May 22 1947]
VWL5051 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams, Adrian Boult and others to the Editor of The Times 19500220 February 20 [1950]
VWL4327 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams’s cat to Marjory Jordan 19510829 Aug 29 1951
VWL4585 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams’s cat to Marjory Jordan 19530913 September 13th. [1953]
VWL1854 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Zoltán Kodály 193311-- [November 1933]
VWL3746 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Winifred Cole 19500426 April 26 [1950]
VWL3715 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Winifred Cole 19510512 12 May 1951
VWL3850 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William Williams 19290124 Jan 24th 1929
VWL192 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William Turner Levy 19511227 27th December, 1951.
VWL4428 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William Turner Levy 19520416 16th April, 1952
VWL456 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William Rothenstein 19191209 9/12/19
VWL1542 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William Rothenstein 19410624 June 24 [?1941]
VWL358 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William Rothenstein 19190822 22/8/19
VWL937 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William Rothenstein 19360315 March 15 [1936]
VWL732 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William Rothenstein 19350608 [8th June 1935]
VWL357 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William Rothenstein 191910-- [?about October 1919 ]
VWL455 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William Rothenstein 19191123 23/11/19
VWL498 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William Rothenstein 19220627 [27th June 1922]
VWL359 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William Rothenstein 19191127 27/11/19
VWL486 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William Rothenstein 192001-- [?January 1920]
VWL500 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William Rothenstein 19220701 [1st July 1922]
VWL691 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William Rothenstein 193703-- [?About March 1937]
VWL756 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William Rothenstein 19350710 July 10 [1935]
VWL1250 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William Rothenstein 19371101 Nov 1st [1937]
VWL457 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William Rothenstein 19191225 Dec 25 [1919]
VWL534 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William Rothenstein 19231021 21/10/23
VWL4664 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William Plomer 19410622 June 22 1941
VWL223 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to William McNaught 19090722 [22 July 1909]

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