1872–1958 · Modern
Ralph Vaughan Williams
6 works
Vaughan Williams was born at Down Ampney in Gloucestershire and died in London. From 1903 to 1904 he travelled the English countryside noting down traditional songs, and their modal forms shaped his style. He edited the music of The English Hymnal from 1904 to 1906, and his music draws on Tudor and Stuart composers such as Tallis, Byrd and Purcell. In 1907 and 1908 he studied with Ravel in Paris. His harmony is modal, with a French touch, and melody is its basis.
The Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis (1910) was first played in Gloucester Cathedral at the Three Choirs Festival and revised in 1913 and 1919. It uses a double string orchestra and a string quartet. The theme is a psalm tune by Tallis in the Phrygian mode, from Archbishop Parker's Psalter of 1567. The three groups answer one another like an echo.
The Lark Ascending was finished in 1914 for violin and piano, first played in December 1920, and its orchestral version was first heard in 1921; it is dedicated to the violinist Marie Hall. Twelve lines of George Meredith's poem head the score. The Fantasia on Greensleeves, arranged in 1934 by Ralph Greaves under the composer's supervision, comes from the opera Sir John in Love, where the tune is Mistress Ford's. It is for strings and harp, with optional flutes.
What to listen for
- In the Tallis Fantasia, a very soft opening with plucked low strings, then a second orchestra answering the first as an echo, and solo violin and viola lines.
- The modal sound: the Tallis tune is in the Phrygian mode, in which the second note lies a semitone above the first, which gives it an old, church-like colour.
- In The Lark Ascending, a solo violin cadenza written without bar-lines, trills like a lark, and folk-like tunes in the flutes and then the oboe.
- In Greensleeves, the famous tune, a contrasting folk tune (Lovely Joan) in the middle, and the return of Greensleeves.
Sources: Ralph Vaughan Williams (Wikipedia), Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis (Wikipedia), The Lark Ascending (Vaughan Williams) (Wikipedia), Fantasia on Greensleeves (AllClassical research notes), UC Davis Arts: Vaughan Williams, Fantasia on Greensleeves