Welcome to the Vaughan Williams Foundation – one of the foremost sources of funding for recent and contemporary music in the UK
The Vaughan Williams Foundation is a new grant-giving charity which upholds the values and vision of the celebrated composer Ralph Vaughan Williams and his wife Ursula Vaughan Williams.
Our principal aims are to honour RVW’s desire to support his fellow composers, and to help make his own work widely accessible to the general public.
VWF was founded in 2022, 150 years after the composer’s birth, and brings together the two charities originally set up by Ralph (RVW Trust) and Ursula (Vaughan Williams Charitable Trust).
Funding
VWF supports the work of British/Irish composers from the last 100 years, as well as projects which further the knowledge and understanding of the life and music of Ralph Vaughan Williams, and of the work of Ursula Vaughan Williams.
Applications for funding are now open. Ensembles, organisations and individuals are invited to apply.
The Foundation also offers annual Vaughan Williams Bursaries for postgraduate composition students.
RVW150
12 October 2022 marked the 150th anniversary of the birth of Ralph Vaughan Williams, and the launch of this Foundation and #RVW150 celebrations continued into the summer of 2023.
Find out more about the composer and explore some of the projects which happened in the anniversary year
READ THE LATEST
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Vaughan Williams Foundation
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The lament of many a composer we suspect! 🎶
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Vaughan Williams Foundation
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A sweet letter from Ursula Vaughan Williams to Joan Shaw, revealing the few things a composer needs!
We assume that by ‘Martin’ she is referring to Martin Shaw, Joan’s husband, who composed Morning Has Broken.
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Vaughan Williams wrote his first score for the 1941 propaganda film ‘The 49th Parallel’ and went on to score another 10 films, including the celebrated ‘Scott of the Antarctic’.
📻 Find out more in this @BBCRadio3 Sound of Cinema podcast: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m001cyly
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St Martin’s Voices
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We are delighted to announce the premiere of ‘Maeshowe’ by @annadsmusic – part of our #ikonoflight concert with @PiattiQuartet on Tues 23 April 🎶
With grateful thanks to the Vaughan Williams Foundation and Hinrichsen Foundation.
🎟️ Tickets here: https://www.stmartin-in-the-fields.org/calendar/st-martins-voices-ikon-of-light/
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Vaughan Williams Foundation
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The first movement of Vaughan Williams’ “In Windsor Forest”, a cantata for chorus and orchestra, from the album, “Retrospect”, released this year by the @theLCSmusic led by Michael Waldron.
📺 Watch here: https://bit.ly/3PZ3rXy
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A note from Vaughan Williams to the head teacher of @CharterhouseSch.
RVW is giving thanks for hospitality received on the occasion for which he’d written Solemn Music for the Masque of Charterhouse (Catalogue of Works 1950/4), incorporating the ‘Carmen Carthusianum’.
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Vaughan Williams Foundation
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“When lonely Ursula writes to composer Ralph Vaughan Williams with an idea for a ballet, little does she realise she will become the creative partner and muse of a genius as well as one corner of a love triangle”
Musical play, A Lark, is at @DorkingHalls from April 19 to 21.
Vaughan Williams Foundation
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“It is a humbling and moving experience to bring Vaughan Williams’ music to an orchestra unfamiliar with him and then feel how the atmosphere in the rehearsal room shifts from polite, dutiful curiosity to downright admiration and enthusiasm” – Andrew Manze
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A programme backed by us and produced by the Music Teachers’ Association, has been set up to provide resources for the teaching of various aspects of RVW’s work, from Early Years Foundation Stage through to Key Stage 5.
Find the free resources here: https://bit.ly/3VPrZWQ
Vaughan Williams Foundation
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⌛ Funding deadline on Friday!
We are welcoming applications for our VWF bursaries, available to support students accepted on MA courses in composition, and who intend to follow careers as composers.
Find out more here:
THE LETTERS OF RALPH VAUGHAN WILLIAMS
Featured Letter
Get to know the man and his music
RVW’s wide-ranging correspondence – with family, pupils, fellow composers, conductors and performers – paints an intriguing portrait of the man, as well as providing fascinating insights into his major preoccupations: musical, personal and political.
Our searchable database includes over 5000 annotated transcriptions of his correspondence all available to read online.
Letter of the Day
Letter from Ralph Vaughan Williams to Beatrice Harrison
Letter No.: VWL5243
The White Gates
Dorking
10 Sep [1943]
Dear Miss Harrison
Thankyou very much – so few people realize that one wants one’s friends to tell one when they are pleased
Yrs sincerely
R Vaughan Williams
