THE LETTERS OF RALPH VAUGHAN WILLIAMS

March, 1959

VAUGHAN WILLIAMS MEMORIAL
THE ENGLISH FOLK-DANCE AND SONG SOCIETY

Dear Sir (Madam),
I thought you would like to know that this Appeal has been launched, in order to endow the Library at Cecil SHarp House as the permanent national memorial to the late Dr. Ralph Vaughan Williams, the outstanding English composer of his day.
Vaughan Williams gladly acknowledged throughout his long life the debt that he owed to the folk songs and tunes of England, from which much of his inspiration was drawn.  He often came to Cecil Sharp House, as a friend and as President of the English Folk Dance and Song Society.  His widow, Mrs Ursula Vaughan Williams, has written of his close association with the Library:
“It is a fitting and happy idea to make the Library, with its scholarly means for research, a memorial to Ralph Vaughan Williams, where the most beatiful forms of English folk music are to be found together whith the whole background of historical, mythical and musical thought from which they sprang.  That this Library should, in time, become the centre of all who share his love of this great contribution to the musical life of England is a tribute he would have been proud to accept, particularly since the heart of the collection is the library of his friend and admired colleague, Cecil Sharp”.
We need £50,000 as a permanent endowment for the Library.  My co-Trustees, and I, hope that you will be able to accept the accompanying invitation to the Dinner in the Saddler’ Hall, in the City of London, on 16th April, when we hope to rase a substantial sum of money towards the target named.  If you are not free to come, I hope that you will still let us have your donation; it will be gratefully acknowleged and faithfully applied.
Do please help.
Yours sincerely,
Margot Fonteyn de Arias