Great Composers: Ralph Vaughan Williams

[@osutuba]

His Concerto for Tuba is an amazing piece, as are his Six English Folk Songs solo.

[@worldmusictheory]

England was sometimes referred to as “the land without music” yet it was the first country in europe to use thirds and sixths as consonant intervals in polyphonic textures. The use of these intervals was then referred to on the continent as “Contenance Angloise” or the “English Manner”

[@dolinaj1]

Let’s not forget Henry Purcell and Georg Friedrich Handel.

[@problemchimp4231]

Loved this. RVW...I think I have everything by him. So much & so much variety...love, love his stuff...& his politics.

[@pauladams6070]

I always go for Sir Adrian Boult recordings. He was there at the right time to ask the composer directly. The 5th Symphony is my favourite. Pilgrim's Progress is up there as well. Great video!

[@gabrieru1983]

Many, many thanks Thomas!!!! My favourite composer ever!!!

[@williamrubinstein3442]

The greatest of all.

[@pauldelcour]

Very interesting overview of my beloved RVW!

[@wyattwahlgren8883]

All of my tuba friends are obsessed with his tuba concerto.

[@georgealderson4424]

How many tuba pieces are there?

[@wyattwahlgren8883]

@@georgealderson4424 That is hard to answer because 'tuba piece' could mean a lot of things. Lots of advanced wind ensemble music has good tuba parts. Lots of late romantic composers wrote really well for the tuba. John Williams wrote a tuba concerto as well. People are also taking notice to the euphonium (finally). Basically, over the past century, people have been taking notice to instruments other than just the violin and the piano. At this point, there are probably dozens of tuba concertos out there waiting to be discovered (euphonium too).

[@georgealderson4424]

@@wyattwahlgren8883 Great. Enjoy researching and rehearsing them

[@beasheerhan4482]

Yes, but, they are all tuba players, which means that something is wrong with them right from the start:)

[@gammafoxlore2981]

@@beasheerhan4482 Tubists are fine, at least they're not organists.

[@andrewkeeling9935]

Well researched and thank you.

[@emilynightingale7758]

Thank you so much for putting my request in your video! This is really useful context for our set work, on wenlock edge. Your videos are really interesting and informative.

[@loudrimshot]

My favorite pieces by him are his 8th and 9th symphonies. Brilliant pieces. They lift me up with their sheer creativity.

[@jackwilmoresongs]

My favorite Vaughn Williams symphony is his 5th. Thanks again for you labors.

[@TheSIGHTREADINGProject]

Wonderful video, so informative. I heard Norfolk Rhapsody No1 for the first time on New Years Eve and was blown away by it. That area of the countryside and the Fens is very familiar to me and it's been a delight discovering Vaughan Williams' joy of it. I'm also learning viola so it was such a surprise to hear a viola solo in Norfolk 1. Really glad you mentioned the subject here too.

[@RhapsodyOfJoy]

Happy B-day, Ralph Vaughan Williams 🎂 💐

[@marthaibarra3829]

Tanks for your information congratulations from Mexico City

[@robertparry4331]

THANK YOU.A GREAT TALK.

[@Shay_Segev]

The 5th with LSO / Previn 💙

[@alexscott1257]

That Passacaglia!!! 💙💙💙💙💙💙

[@hugomiller1025]

RVW used to collect folk songs in my home town of Horsham, Sussex, at the turn of the twentieth century. He lived in Dorking, ten miles north of here, for much of his life, and his family home was Leith Hill Place, near Dorking. I grew up in a village called Kingsfold, where RVW used to collect folk songs at the local pub, the 'Wheatsheaf'. The tune 'Dives and Lazarus' (as in 'Five Variants Of...') is actually called 'Kingsfold'. Many of the villagers from whom he collected songs, with his primitive Phonograph recording machine, still have families in this area. His great uncle was Charles Darwin, and the familiy were related to the Wedgewoods (as in pottery). Lucy Broadwood (as in the pianos) lived in Rusper, between Horsham and Dorking, and she too collected folks songs at that time, along with Cecil Sharp. What a treasure-trove of music would have been lost forever had they not donw so. I believe it was RVW's mother (or possibly his wife?) who blamed the loss of the oral tradition, whereby folk songs were passed down the generations, on the recent Education Act, which taught everybody to read and write. I love the description of RVW as an old man (but I can't remember who described him thus) as "A haystack of a man - like an old sofa with the stuffing coming out in places". This would be a reflection of his typically British untidy dress style. Maurice Ravel commented that RVW "couldn't tell the difference between good food and bad food" - another British characteristic! Purely co-incidentally, RVW has always been one of my favourite composers. For some strange reason, I am always drawn towards 'modal' music - particularly the Dorian mode, and indeed the Mixolydian, but anything with a flattened seventh. PS it's 'Vaughan' Williams, not 'Von' Williams! ;)

[@ClassicalNerd]

"Vaughan" and "Von" are pronounced the same in to a boy from the southern US. :)

[@seanfinlay6822]

There’s an interesting concert this Sunday, 16th June, at Leith Hill Place, fiddle and harp.

[@TJ.Turner]

That's one thing I like about your videos, I get to hear the correct pronunciation of names I've only read but have never heard.

[@ClassicalNerd]

Thank you! I don't always get them all right, but I try my best to say the right thing if I know it.

[@hugomiller1025]

@@ClassicalNerd Haha like that well known German composer Ralph Von Williams ;)

[@LynnePedigoRidayReiter]

Hi--I'm a 72 year old music ed grad (Westminster Choir College class of 75) who wants to deepen my knowledge of composers. I got a record player again, after doing without for a few decades. I missed that tactile and audio experience. My knowledge of the 'second string' composers is sadly lacking. I appreciate your in-depth knowlege. I enjoyed your presentation very much.

[@robertcocovinis5269]

Thanks for this video. I've just been to hear the 4th and loved it, now curious to hear more. BTW I really enjoy your style of presentation. Fascinating facts delivered with touches of humour.

[@brendaboykin3281]

Thanx, Tom🌹🌹🌹

[@Mackeson3]

He was very helpful to the next generation of British composers e.g. Benjamin Britten, (Although they didn't really care for one another's music) and Michael Tippett. There is a lovely story about RVW whilst in The USA met a young composer who showed him one of his own very modernistic works. RVW looked at the score and then handed it back to him saying "If you ever think of a tune do let me know!" On the other hand he (unsurprisingly) admired the work of Samuel Barber. Barber played and sang his own "Dover Beach" to RVW , who apparently said to him "You've just about nailed it, I tried to set that poem myself but just couldn't get it right"

[@HaliPuppeh]

Vaughan Williams is one of my favorite composers. I first became acquainted with him through an arrangement of "Linden Lea" in band.

[@emilywalker6253]

I loved this overview. You really have a gift!!!

[@Yossus]

I spent 6 years of my life in England, 5 of them singing in choirs with a wide repertoire. Also sang some Vaughan Williams, both choral and solo works. Never once corrected anyone my assumption that the gh wasn't silent. This will keep me up in shame tonight.

[@georgealderson4424]

Relax! I am English and cannot accept the pronunciation "Rafe" so just enjoy the music

[@Cubehead27]

A note as a person from a Protestant background who knows a fair few hymns - Holst and Vaughan Williams's hymn arrangements are still around for a reason, they're quite possibly the best ones out there (Vaughan Williams's "Kingsfold" and Holst's "In the Bleak Midwinter" are easily my top two of all time)

[@Graham-ce2yk]

I'm glad you liked the Sea Symphony, my own personal preferences are Nºs 4 & 6 but with slightly different reasons for each. I hope one day you get around to Charles Villers Stanford, he ended up teaching a lot of the next generation of British Composers, though not Benjamin Brittain, that was left for Frank Bridge another interesting British composer from that late Victorian/Edwardian/WWI transition period. Of Stanfords music, the 3rd Symphony 'Irish' and 3rd Irish Rhapsody (For Cello & Orchestra) are the ones I keep going back to.

[@ClassicalNerd]

Duly noted: lentovivace.com/classicalnerd.html

[@hugomiller1025]

Stanford's symphonies are superb.

[@thecardboardstacker]

Thank you! Very informative and entertaining.

[@beasheerhan4482]

Thank you so very much for this fascinatingly impertinent biography on the man. My spouse and I have fallen in love with his landscape genre pieces and wanted to know something of what lay behind that. Thank you, again!

[@ClassicalNerd]

My pleasure! Glad you enjoyed.

[@ClassicsAndVinyl]

I've just found your great channel! There's lots to discover ;o) A suggestion for a future composer profile: Arnold Bax - a south London boy who spent his life pretending to be Irish; an Irish Republican sympathiser who went on to be knighted and became Composer Of The King's Music.

[@ClassicalNerd]

Duly noted: lentovivace.com/classicalnerd.html

[@joerhodes8785]

BEHOLD...THE..CEEEEEEEEEEEEEE ! ! ! !🐟🐋🐡⛵⚓🌊. I also really enjoy Symphony #1, I have the Sir Adrian Boult EMI box set. I think I'm going to revisit this music.

[@leonardzane]

Excellent summary! If you ever amend this presentations, please do include the magnificent 5th Symphony, which greatly heartened the British and free world from WW2 onward -- plus its dedication to Jean Sibelius, who also should be cited as a parallel 1st Symphony inspiration.

[@nickbrown277]

The subtitles are extraordinary !! eg. The Composer Parry is written as Perry and Vaughan (Williams) is written as Vaughn.

[@osutuba]

I'd love to see one of these on Percy Granger

[@pabmusic1]

Very good. One thing, though. Percy Grainger was British (not English) by virtue of the fact that Australians were British until 1948. In some ways Australia was a fifth 'home country' after England, Scotland Wales and (Northern) Ireland. Also, RVW didn't consider the Sea Symphony his first when he wrote it. In 1911, when George Butterworth suggested he write a symphony (the London as it became) RVW responded that he'd never written a symphony and didn't intend to write one. Butterworth persuaded him, though - and it's clear that he also regarded the London as RVW's first. The programme note for the first performance of the Sea actually say that the word 'symphony' refers to the symphonic way RVW had edited Whitman's text. Things changed only in 1956 when his publisher insisted on a number for his new symphony. By that time Decca had recorded 7 'symphonies' without numbers, so RVW grudgingly agreed to 'No. 8'. Also, Elgar was the person most responsible for the rebirth of English music.

[@hugomiller1025]

Bit of a nutter, wasn't he? ;)

[@popolala2160]

Video request:Leopold godowsky,Franz schubert, carlo gesualdo

[@ClassicalNerd]

Your requests have been noted.

[@BB-xm8jc]

Could you do a video on francisco tarrega or fernando sor? Two spanish guitarists. Also, i am so glad i found your channel. You give so much info in one video that i could do in a weeks of reasearch. Thank you!

[@ClassicalNerd]

Tárrega and Sor have been added at www.lentovivace.com/classicalnerd.html.

[@vesteel]

Can you do one for Arnold Bax? thanks!

[@ClassicalNerd]

Duly noted: lentovivace.com/classicalnerd.html

[@Allusionary]

Bravo! Your talk is very informative. It's even-handed while being enthusiastic. RVW was a truly great composer. He was spiritually-minded without being religious, which you made crystal clear.

[@neo-eclesiastul9386]

Hard to say that Tchaikovsky 1st Symphony was not quite good. Winter Dreams is a lovely piece of cake!

[@hugomiller1025]

Absolutely - and 2 & 3. Then it started going downhill.

[@271250cl]

Thanks for this! Can it really be that you haven't yet done Elgar and Britten? :)

[@ClassicalNerd]

lentovivace.com/classicalnerd.html

[@titicoqui]

bravo

[@ArmoredLion217]

What is the authoritative source on pronouncing his first name? As one who works in radio, we always strive to find the pronunciation of a name according to the person themselves, even when it contradicts with the way the person's heritage might call for.

[@supercarluvr]

It'd be great if you'd consider doing Henri Dutilleux. A composer who defied "isms" and who wrote some of the most sensual, most well crafted music I can think of.

[@ClassicalNerd]

Dutilleux has received a bump in the request pool.

[@geo1496]

Request: (if you haven’t done a video on him yet) Conlon Nancarrow

[@ClassicalNerd]

Nancarrow has been bumped in the request pool.

[@ВладМарк-п3т]

Video request: Pancho Vladigerov, the patriarch of Bulgarian classical music

[@ClassicalNerd]

Duly noted: lentovivace.com/classicalnerd.html

[@ziklag3369]

Concerto for Two Pianos!

[@zackmaster79]

Folk song suite

[@annakimborahpa]

What were the composers called who came after the cerealists? The granolists? Also, I think Bruckner wrote the greatest Symphony No. 0.

[@hugomiller1025]

I believe 'Die Nulte' was actually his second symphony (not counting number 00!).

[@jddennison]

becca stevens! What a mashup, she's the GOAT

[@emilynightingale7758]

1:07 does anyone else remember veggie tales?

[@hnywening6080]

D O N 'T B E S O S I L L Y ! (yes)

[@skulptor]

Who is this von williams? A Dutchman?

[@seanramsdell4172]

Can I upvote Oliveros and Bruch?

[@ClassicalNerd]

Upvotes count as requests, so unfortunately, no.

[@oldedwardian1778]

NO.

[@_rstcm]

I didn't know you weren't supposed to pronounce the g in Vaughan!

[@ClassicalNerd]

I don't even know how one _would,_ to be quite honest ... Vogue-an??

[@_rstcm]

@@ClassicalNerd Honestly............I thought it was Vaw-gun! 😅😅😅😅

[@oldedwardian1778]

Its SIR HUBERT PARRY NOT PERRY. He was born in Gloucestershire NOT NEAR WALES.

[@10cclo25]

Your history is interesting but I found myself waiting for your screen "jumps" where you are constantly moving position . on the screen. I couldnt watch this for more than a few minutes so a shame..

[@SunriseFireberry]

Anglicans hired RVW to edit their hymnal. Took him 2 yr. He wasn't religious but they got him anyway. Working with some of the greatest tunes (yes, some others were really bad) positively influenced the composer. You speak of disconnect? Try Herbert Howells, who cranked out lots of Anglican church music. The Anglicans got their musicians by their musical merit, not their religious views. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Anglican_church_composers Wonder how many, out of all of these, were devout Anglicans? G. Finzi, for instance, was Jewish. Some of the Anglican music in its earlier days got some of their music by hiring Catholic composers. More on disconnect. How about the church music of bohemian Schubert? The religious carol O Holy Night was by A Adam, with words by Cappeau, both secularists.

[@ClassicalNerd]

Well, by no means was Vaughan Williams the _only_ non-Anglican to write Anglican hymns, but I felt like it was worth mentioning in the video nonetheless (and in no small part because I had to play _For All the Saints_ just last month). Personally, I think the most intriguing tale of a disconnect such as this is that of William Byrd, who was secretly Catholic in an era when Catholics were getting violently persecuted.

[@SunriseFireberry]

@@ClassicalNerd Who knows, you may want to do a whole video about various disconnects & different forces at work re this For All the Saints vid from very recent history kzbin.info/www/bejne/a4GcpaWPeruYaMU

[@ap8211]

I stg all famous english people are related

[@cesargoodman5753]

RVE started to write his Sea Symphony three years earlier than the 8th by Mahler, but Mahler finished his 8th three years before Williams...so, it depends on your perspective of "which one goes first" The first in be written as who started to write before or who finished it first... Let's say: it is a tie

[@PhiladelphiaWoodwinder]

I could start the process of earning my doctorate degree and 18 months later my brother could begin the same process. If I dally and my brother earns his and graduates first, and I graduate a week later, did we still earn our degrees at the same time?

[@barbmiller9285]

“Sucked”?

[@seanramsdell4172]

Veggietales fan?

[@ClassicalNerd]

Let's just say that I often catch myself humming the tune to "The Pirates that Don't Do Anything" ...

[@seanramsdell4172]

Do I see a Peanuts comic?

[@ClassicalNerd]

Yep! It features Schroeder, and was a gift to me by the former organist at my church.

[@georgealderson4424]

@@ClassicalNerd Are you the current organist now or a member of the congregation Sir? Blessings and peace

[@ClassicalNerd]

I always say that I'm more "a guy who plays the organ" than a true organist. I started out as a pianist before becoming a musicologically-inclined composer, but have no formal organ training. I'm fortunate to play for a small congregation for whom the minutiae of organ performance are mostly irrelevant.

[@georgealderson4424]

@@ClassicalNerd Worship is for the glory of Almighty God not for a competition and I have no doubt that you are all loved and appreciated by Him! Blessings and peace to you and all your Church brothers and sisters.

[@merekr439]

Actually, the greatest First Symphony is Brahms'. Without question.

[@ClassicalNerd]

Brahms 1 is definitely a great piece! I'm just personally a sucker for choral-orchestral forces.

[@merekr439]

@@ClassicalNerd I get it CN, but if you're talking first symphonies, well, he did have the pressure of composing a symphony at the level of Beethoven's 9th! What other composer could have done that? Especially with the craftsmanship and genius of Brahms? I can't think of anyone else.

[@ClassicalNerd]

It's an discussion, to be sure! They're so different in their eras, their ages, and what they were trying to accomplish with their symphonies, that direct comparison is as tricky as it is ultimately unhelpful. I could see someone making solid cases for Brahms, Vaughan Williams, and Mahler: Brahms for all the reasons that you mentioned, Vaughan Williams for his revitalization of British music in the first (by premiere date) fully choral symphony, and Mahler for the maturity of how his first work in the genre explores the different sound-worlds from which he would come to fashion his symphonic career. (Outside of these, I could see someone trying to make a stab at promoting the forward-thinking programmaticism of Berlioz or the postmodernism of Schnittke, although those are significantly weaker arguments.)

[@giovannipierre5309]

M rk Elgar’s First symphony is in a different league.

[@oldedwardian1778]

Look I love Brahms and I mean LOVE his music. But to make such a DUMB STUPID remark like "Actually, the greatest First Symphony is Brahms" is IDIOTIC. VW was known as the GREAT VW for a reason.