Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to E.J. Moeran
Letter No. VWL5062
Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to E.J. Moeran
Letter No.: VWL5062
From R. Vaughan Williams,
The White Gates,
Westcott Road,
Dorking.
February 8 [1935]
Dear Moeran
Many thanks for the copy of the Nocturne – I thought it beautiful – I think the references to Delius in the Press are absurd. Doubtless if Delius had not existed it might not have been written. Just as Delius would not have been written without Grieg or Grieg without Schumann and so on back to Tubal Cain.
I find in your work a distinction of style that I fail to find usually in Delius with the notable exception of the Wedding Procession (not the Paradise Garden) in Romeo & Juliet.
Yrs
R Vaughan Williams
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General Notes:
Year dated implied from the publication of Moeran’s setting of Don Juan Tenorio the Great from words from Robert Nichols’s play which was written in 1934 for the Norwich Philharmonic Society, and dedicated “To the Memory of Frederick Delius”. VW may have been writing following the London premiere in 1936.
In the hand of AVW, signed by VW.Offered for sale at online auction RRAuction 6 February 2019.
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Citation:Foreman, Lewis, From Parry to Britten: British Music in Letters, 1900-1945, no.167; Composers' Letters, edited by Jan Fielden, Marginalia Press, 1994, p.147
