Ralph Vaughan Williams

[Guest]

Is he cool?

(I'm just watching a terrific documentary about him, and so far he comes across as a bit of a dude.)

[wingco]

Ralph Vaughan Williams

Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis. Check it out.

[Andy C]

Ralph Vaughan Williams

For me, he's the greatest of the great. Partly, for me, it's a subjective identification: here was a man who could see the immense power in the ostensible simplicity of English folk music, however, wheras I can only admit to my own appreciation of those songs and tunes, RVW had the ability and craft to develop that latent power into something truly magnificent. Nobody before or since has written for strings with such profundity: few have used music to convey and explore such depths of feeling.

Although a lot of his work has religious overtones, he was an atheist; although he tended to keep his political views personal he was a socialist and pacifist. By all accounts he was a wonderful teacher - I knew somebody who'd been his pupil - strongly believing that for anybody to make music, no matter how constrained by lack of ability, was better than to passively receive it. His philosophy was that everybody should have their own music: his music was always very much that, deeply personal - but at the same time dazzlingly universal.

Where to start? Yes, the Tallis Fantasia is the absolute shining jewel. I'd also advocate the middle symphonies, numbers 3 - 6. My favourite vocal works are the Serenade to Music, a setting of a passage from The Merchant of Venice written as a present to Sir Henry Wood, and the Five Tudor Portraits, but there are gems throughout his canon.

Yep, he's cool. (He wrote Sinfonia Antarctica, after all.)

[Guest]

Ralph Vaughan Williams

Thanks very much Andy. I certainly had you in mind!

The documentary was a flat-out sizzler in the end, perfectly balancing tittle-tattle about his life with exactly how his private tumults informed his work. Highly recommended: 23 May BBC4. Watching it as a VW virgin, Flos Campi and Job piqued my interest most.

Incidentally, the film strongly argues against VW as a pacifist, reporting that he lied about his age in order to serve in the First World War (notwithstanding that combat inspired him to write passionate pieces longing for peace and mourning the dead soldiers), and got in a strop with another composer (Tippett? I've forgotten) who didn't want to go to war with Hitler.

[Andy C]

Ralph Vaughan Williams

Possibly Tippett, who was imprisoned as a conscientious objector, although RVW acted as a witness in support of Tippett in the internment proceedings.

Yeah, "pacifist" is probably the wrong word, with its precise political meaning and all that. But his experiences in the First World War certainly left him with a conviction that war was a terrible thing. It was only his greater conviction that Nazism was an even greater evil and that the potential outcome of not opposing Nazism would be even worse for humanity than war itself (he'd been involved in anti-Nazi organisations and worked to aid Jewish refugees in the 1930s) that forced him to subjugate his anti-war sentiments.

[Guest]

Ralph Vaughan Williams

Ah, I see. Yeah, the film (it's by John Bridcut) says what you just said.

[hobbes]

Ralph Vaughan Williams

I saw Janine Jansen play "A Lark Ascending" at the proms once. It was one of the most beautiful, magical 10 minutes of my life.

Blimey - it's here:-

[Purves Grundy]

Ralph Vaughan Williams

But his experiences in the First World War certainly left him with a conviction that war was a terrible thing. It was only his greater conviction that Nazism was an even greater evil and that the potential outcome of not opposing Nazism would be even worse for humanity than war itself (he'd been involved in anti-Nazi organisations and worked to aid Jewish refugees in the 1930s) that forced him to subjugate his anti-war sentiments.

Couldn't you make an identical claim for pretty much everyone up to and including Churchill?

[Lucia Lanigan]

Ralph Vaughan Williams

Ah, this must the doc I remember the director having a right go at the BBC for rejecting last year, on the grounds that, "having looked at our own activity via the lens of find, play & share", they decided the film did not fit with 'the new vision for [BBC] Vision."

Glad it's a belter.

[Andy C]

Ralph Vaughan Williams

No, I don't think so. Even after the First World War I think the orthodoxy was that military might was a positive, desirable thing, and not just as a defence or deterrent. War was a legitimate means of furthering national interest and national prestige, and still a glorious undertaking.

It's all rather difficult to quantify, though.

[ian.64]

Ralph Vaughan Williams

I saw Janine Jansen play "A Lark Ascending" at the proms once. It was one of the most beautiful, magical 10 minutes of my life.

There's quite a few pieces of music that move me, but that's the one that reduces me to a huge heap of tears and makes me thankful for it.

[Guest]

Ralph Vaughan Williams

Not Me: presumably the Palmer one was the one Five showed on New Year's Day just gone. At 9am, which must have done nothing for Palmer's blood pressure. It was well received but I didn't see it.

This one is the one the piece mentions as having already been commissioned by the BBC (which makes the article a non-story, apart from the weird rejection letter).

[wingco]

Ralph Vaughan Williams

I've just watched this documentary, which I'm reviewing. Thoroughly recommended.

[Disco Child Ballads]

Ralph Vaughan Williams

There's a lot of Vaughn Williams stuff at this year's proms. Anyone interested in going to any of them and what would be particularly good?

[Eggchaser]

Ralph Vaughan Williams

Couldn't you make an identical claim for pretty much everyone up to and including Churchill?

Well, Oswald Mosley & Viscount Rothermere aside.

When my father and aunt were going through my uncle's possessions just after he died, they found A Lark Ascending in his CD player so we played that at the crematorium. Shit, I'm getting tears in my eyes right now just thinking about it.

[Guest]

Ralph Vaughan Williams

This programme's on tonight.