National Music and Other Essays

Ralph Vaughan Williams is one of the greatest English composers. He studied under such teachers as Parry, Charles Wood, and Alan Gray, and later in Germany with Max Bruch and in France with Ravel, developing a strongly individual style that marked him out, with Holst and others as one of the leaders of the 20th-century revival of English music. He never hesitated to express his views in plain, vigorous prose, and he became well-known for his essays which combine typical common sense with a true composer's sensitivity. This collection contains all his writings that he thought worth preserving in book form. The themes and subjects discussed in these essays reflect his wide range of interests and cover such topics as nationalism in music, the evolution of folk-song, and the origins of music, as well as pieces on individual composers such as Beethoven, Gustav Holst, Bach, Sibelius, Arnold Bax, and Elgar. Also included are more general reflections of the making of music, its purpose and effects, and the social foundations of music.