THE LETTERS OF RALPH VAUGHAN WILLIAMS

11 Roxburghe Mansions
Kensington Court
W.8

Nov 12 [1933]

Dear Foss
re Greensleeves
I cannot criticize Greaves’ arrangement without a copy of the music which I have not by me.  But I suggest that if he wants a “B” to go between the two “A’s” the obvious thing would be the folk-tune “Lovely Joan” as it appears in the Interlude between scenes I & 2 of Act II.¹
re Music from Percival
Would you mind keeping this till we decide what to do with it – But meanwhile could you send me the vocal score of all 3 scenes to this address?  I want to show it to Gordon at the R.C.M.²
Yours sincerely
R. Vaughan Williams

1.  Oxford University Press had received requests for an arrangement for strings of the Greensleeves music from Sir John in Love and had decided to commission Ralph Greaves to make it under VW’s supervision.  It was published in 1934 as Fantasia on Greensleeves and ‘Lovely Joan’ was indeed used as the central section of the piece.  On 14 November Foss wrote to Greaves with VW’s comments.
2. Royal College of Music.  Robert Percival had produced and conducted six performances of Sir John in Love by Bristol Opera School at the Victoria Rooms in Bristol on 30 October 1933, see Catalogue of Works 1928/3a. These performances included the additional music – the Prologue, Episode and Interlude – which VW had composed after the first performance at the RCM to cover scene changes. See the full score of Sir John in Love, published by Oxford University Press in 2020, edited by David Lloyd-Jones, for further details of the early performance history. Oxford University Press published the excerpts in 1936.  Gordon is Jack Gordon as in VWL1122.