THE LETTERS OF RALPH VAUGHAN WILLIAMS

8/6/18

Dear Evans¹

Many thanks for your letter – I was much interested in your letter – it seemed most sound as far as I can judge – Thank you very much for it and also for all you are doing for English music.
As regards your Italian scheme – my difficulty is that almost all my important music – orchestral and chamber is in M.S. and my ‘Sea Symphony’ is out of print!²
However I am sending what I can. I hope to be able to send a copy of the last thing I wrote – 5 hymns for tenor & string orch  (arranged for pfte & viola) which Boosey printed just before the war but never published.³
My address is
2/Lt R Vaughan Williams R G A
141 Heavy Battery
BEF France

I have been here about 5 months looking after horses – a curious fate!
Yrs very sincerely

R. Vaughan Williams

1. Music critic of the Pall Mall Gazette. His interest in and support for contemporary English music was important for composers such as VW.
2. This ‘scheme’ is not clarified.
3. The work was published as Four Hymns for tenor voice, with accompaniment of pianoforte and viola obbligato, Catalogue of Works 1914/2. Booseys published the work in 1920. Interestingly VW say ‘5 Hymns’ here. It also appears that VW considers the string orchestra version as the primary one – the piano version remains unpublished. Steuart Wilson presented his set of proofs of the work (dating from 1915) to the British Library (pressmark K.7.g.17).