THE LETTERS OF RALPH VAUGHAN WILLIAMS

Dorking

Oct 15 [after 1943]

Dear Malcolm
Thankyou very much for your letter and for what I am sure was a fine performance of my symph.¹
I should very much like to meet you soon and go through the score and get your suggestions. Perhaps your secretary would give me some of your free times (if any!) & I w^d choose one of them when I was otherwise coming to London to make an appointment.
As regards the 4 horns – it would of course be a confession of weakness & would mean that I do not understand orchestration (which is probably true) – I do not want them on the first 2 movements – so “pride ruled my will” & I determined to do without them altogether. The only place I felt the want of them were end of the slow movement and the climax just before the 3 Trombone chord in the Passacaglia – & I hoped I had successfully faked those – I do not like the idea of ‘ad lib’ horns – either we want 2 horns or 4.
Yrs
RVW

1. Symphony no. 5