Issue 29 - Ralph Vaughan-Williams

It seems like a shame to go through Lent without playing Rhosymedre (My Song is Love Unknown) by Ralph Vaughan-Williams (1872-1958). Since I played all-Brahms for last year's Lent, I couldn't let this Lent go by without playing it as a prelude. It's one of the more recognized pieces in the repertoire and people seem to really love hearing it. It's specifically appropriate to play during this Lent because we've been singing the hymn Rhosymedre immediately following the sermon every week. In the prelude by Vaughan-Williams, the hymn melody is first presented in the left hand, accompanied by a moving bass line and a treble obligato of sixths. The melody then moves to the soprano voice, with the churning sixths still accompanying in the inner voices until it finally descends back to the tenor voice as a coda to close the piece.

More fantastic in character is Vaughan-Williams' setting of Lord, Enthroned in Heavenly Splendor, the postlude for this Sunday. The opening and closing sections are improvisatory and surround an inner, imitative setting of the tune. Both the prelude and postlude are taken from Vaughan-Williams' Three Preludes on Welsh Hymntunes, published in 1920.

Born in Gloucestershire, Vaughan-Williams studied at the Royal College of Music under monumental English composers such as Charles Villiers Stanford and Hubert Parry. However, he also traveled abroad and studied composition with Max Bruch in Berlin and Maurice Ravel in Paris. Vaughan-Williams didn't come back from abroad to merely live in England - he ended up writing music that actually embodies the English countryside and song. Through his travels of England, he was responsible for preserving much of the folk songs of his native land by notating carols and songs that might have otherwise become extinct. He also composed several hymns, the most beloved in our congregation probably being "For All the Saints".

An interesting piece of trivia I learned today: Charles Darwin was Ralph Vaughan-Williams' great uncle!

(Image: Ralph Vaughan-Williams, age 4)