THE LETTERS OF RALPH VAUGHAN WILLIAMS

Tueday [Nov 6 1945]

Belov Boo
Its good to hear of Hemmings. Send all your guests there especially Pumpel!
R had a good day in London – a sandwich lunch on the train & then Nat Gal¹ concert to hear a Bartok 4^tet w^h he admired – at least what he could hear of it – he found himself next to Lorraine & they persuaded him to with them to lunch with the 4^tet – somewhere near by – He seems to have launched some stories in French at lunch – the only others besides the 4^tet were Michael Tippett & the man who runs the concert
The Gertlers² a good 4^tet  – Belgian with no English – Then he was at the R.C.M³ & managed to catch the good 5.30 having a run for it with Arnold Bax.
We listened to the French concert – a lovely little Ravel – a dismal Roussel – & a noisy Bliss.⁴
R is coughing a little more after his outing but that is the rimy morning – He must be quiet “pour mieux sauter” for he is off to London tomorrow to go with Ursula⁵ to Henry IV⁶ – but Ursula is ordering a car & so it s^d be all right & its a matinee
[…]
I like to hear of quintets in the studio
Y^r A

1. National Gallery, London, where lunchtime concerts took place during the war, organised by Myra Hess. This concert, a performance of Mozart’s quartet K421, Beethoven op.59 no.2, and Bartok’s 6th quartet, was on Saturday 3rd November; it appears that AVW wrote this letter across several days.
2. The Gertler Quartet, founded in 1928 by Endre Gertler (1907-1998) and based in Brussels; the quartet specialised in performances of Bartok’s music.
3. Royal College of Music
4. A broadcast on Monday 5 November which included Debussy’s La Mer, Bliss’s The Phoenix, movements from Ravel’s Le Tombeau du Couperin, and Roussel’s Symphonic Suite Bacchus et Ariadne.
5. Ursula Wood
6. Shakespeare’s play Henry IV.