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
VWL5312 Telegram from Vaughan Williams to Tucson Symphony Society 19570114 14 JAN 1957
VWL2020 Oxford University Press file note on Ralph Vaughan Williams’s English version of Bach’s B minor Mass by Norman Peterkin 19451120 20.11.45
VWL1641 Memorandum from Norman Peterkin to Sir Humphrey Milford 19420424 April 24th 1942
VWL5313 Letter from Ursula Vaughan Williams to John Ward 19630214 February 14th 1963
VWL3466 Letter from Ursula Vaughan Williams to Christopher Morris (OUP) 19570217 February 17th 1957.
VWL2795 Letter from Ursula Vaughan Williams to Alan Frank (OUP) 19540228 February 28th [1954]
VWL3449 Letter from Ursula Vaughan Williams to Alan Frank (OUP) 19561125 November 25th 1956.
VWL5321 Letter from Ursula Vaughan Williams to Alan Frank (OUP) 19540920 [late September 1954]
VWL2793 Letter from Ursula Vaughan Williams to Alan Frank (OUP) 19540222 February 22nd [1954]
VWL5315 Letter from Ursula Vaughan Williams to Alan Frank (OUP) 19571020 [late October] 1957
VWL5314 Letter from Ursula Vaughan Williams to Alan Frank (OUP) 19571128 28 Nov 1957
VWL4336 Letter from Ursula Vaughan Williams to Alan Frank 19570118 January 18th 1957
VWL3779 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Sir Humphrey Milford 19420311 March 11 [1942]
VWL112 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Sir Humphrey Milford 19420323 March 23 1942
VWL857 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ralph Greaves 19300430 April 30 [1930?]
VWL1192 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Ralph Greaves 19340225 Feb 25 [1934]
VWL1754 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Oxford University Press 19430309 [9 March 1943]
VWL1368 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to OUP 19380725 July 25 [1938]
VWL1455 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Norman Peterkin (OUP) 19390106 Jan 6 [?1939]
VWL2009 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Norman Peterkin (OUP) 19451021 Oct. 21 [1945]
VWL1878 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Norman Peterkin (OUP) 19450314 14 March, 1945
VWL1899 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Norman Peterkin (OUP) 19450729 [29th July 1945]
VWL1908 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Norman Peterkin (OUP) 19440328 March 28 [1944]
VWL1669 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Norman Peterkin (OUP) 19420531 [31 May 1942]
VWL1681 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Norman Peterkin (OUP) 19420825 Aug: 25 [1942]
VWL2012 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Norman Peterkin (OUP) 19451027 Oct 27 [1945]
VWL1675 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Norman Peterkin (OUP) 19420714 July 14 [1942]
VWL2164 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Norman Peterkin (OUP) 19470407 [7th April 1947]
VWL1578 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Norman Peterkin 19410831 Aug 31 [1941]
VWL1694 Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Norman Peterkin 19420928 Sept 28 [1942]

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