Vaughan Williams: British music, English music
Ralph Vaughan Williams is perhaps Britain’s greatest ever classical composer, but he remains something of an outsider in the world of classical music. His tunes are perhaps a little too tuneful, lowering the tone by appealing rather too readily to those uninitiated into what one should like and value. All the more reason to love and value him and his music I say. The companion piece to this one focused on Vaughan Williams’ 6 th Symphony , a furious piece which, for me, evokes the current travails of the Labour Party and wider left in Britain. I was going to add a few lines to that piece suggesting some more tunes of Vaughan Williams that readers might like to check out. But those few lines became a few paragraphs and then several paragraphs. So here we are... The first thing I wanted to do was showcase music of a different character to the 6 th Symphony. The 6 th is probably my favourite of Vaughan Williams’ nine symphonies, at least in that version, but it is by n...