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108-429: The Composers Guild of Great Britain was founded in 1944 to represent classical music composers, with Ralph Vaughan Williams elected as its first president. The Songwriters' Guild of Great Britain , later known as The British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors was founded in 1947 by Ivor Novello , Sir Alan Herbert, Eric Coates , Haydn Wood , Richard Addinsell , among others, with Eric Maschwitz acting as

216-467: A 56-year-old shelf-stacker at a village in Clackmannanshire for pursuing her for singing to herself while stacking shelves. PRS for Music initially told her that she would be prosecuted and fined thousands of pounds if she continued to sing without a "live performance" licence. However PRS for Music subsequently acknowledged its mistake. In October 2010, it was reported that Sussex Police, in

324-487: A 61-year-old mechanic that he would have to pay £150 to play his radio while he worked by himself. It also targeted a bakery that played a radio in a private room at the back of the shop, a woman who used a classical radio to calm her horses and community centres that allowed children to sing carols in public. However, questions have been raised about the tactic of targeting small businesses: Radio stations pay large amounts of money to licensing organizations PRS and PPL for

432-411: A compulsory course in harmony with Francis Edward Gladstone , professor of organ, counterpoint and harmony, he studied organ with Walter Parratt and composition with Hubert Parry . He idolised Parry, and recalled in his Musical Autobiography (1950): Parry once said to me: "Write choral music as befits an Englishman and a democrat". We pupils of Parry have, if we have been wise, inherited from him

540-465: A depiction of a nuclear-scorched wasteland. The composer was dismissive of programmatic theories: "It never seems to occur to people that a man might just want to write a piece of music." In 1951 Adeline died, aged eighty. In the same year Vaughan Williams's last opera, The Pilgrim's Progress , was staged at Covent Garden as part of the Festival of Britain . He had been working intermittently on

648-577: A failure to find "mutually acceptable terms for a new licence" with PRS for Music. As a consequence, PRS for Music established the Fair Play for Creators campaign in order to provide a forum where musicians could "publicly demonstrate their concern over the way their work is treated by online businesses". David Arnold , Jazzie B , Billy Bragg , Guy Chambers , Robin Gibb , Pete Waterman , Mike Chapman , Wayne Hector , Pam Sheyne and Debbie Wiseman sent

756-466: A jointly owned subsidiary, PPL PRS Ltd, to collect all licence fees for public performances. PPL PRS Ltd is based in Leicester, England. In July 2015, PRS for Music, Sweden collecting society STIM and German collecting society GEMA announced the completion of a joint venture to launch an integrated multi-territory music licensing and processing hub covering European territories. In November 2015, it

864-718: A letter to The Times newspaper in support of the campaign launched by PRS for Music. A rights deal was settled in September 2009 between PRS for Music and Google that allowed YouTube users in UK to view music videos. Wiltshire Constabulary refused to pay PRS for Music for a £32,000 licence fee in April 2009. Instead the force told all officer and civilian staff that music could no longer be played in their workplaces but that ban excluded patrol cars. A total of 38 of 49 UK police forces currently hold PRS for Music licences. In May 2009,

972-462: A licensing deal resulting in a Copyright Tribunal dispute. In July 2016, The Copyright Tribunal awarded in favour of PRS for Music. ITV appealed and subsequently lost a High Court appeal in early 2017. In 2015, PRS for Music entered into a licensing agreement with the Berlin -based company SoundCloud after several months of litigation. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. The Santiago Agreement

1080-454: A lifelong friend. Stanford emphasised the need for his students to be self-critical, but Vaughan Williams and Holst became, and remained, one another's most valued critics; each would play his latest composition to the other while still working on it. Vaughan Williams later observed, "What one really learns from an Academy or College is not so much from one's official teachers as from one's fellow-students ... [we discussed] every subject under

1188-453: A local station, where previously it had been considered a national station. This led to a decrease in royalty rates from £7.50 per minute to 50p per minute of broadcast music. The English-language sister station, BBC Radio Wales, is classified by PRS for Music as a national station and attracts the higher rates. As of December 2012, Eos is in negotiations with the BBC, whose Welsh-language service

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1296-517: A money-saving move, were not intending to renew their PRS for Music licence, meaning that police officers would no longer be able to listen to the radio in their squad cars or other work places. In 2012, a high per centage of Welsh-language musicians left PRS for Music to form a separate agency, Eos (Welsh for nightingale), after changes in the way PRS for Music calculates royalties led to a fifteen-fold decrease in payments. In 2007, PRS for Music had reclassified Welsh-language station BBC Radio Cymru as

1404-514: A more manageable home, "The White Gates", Dorking , where they lived until Adeline's death in 1951. Vaughan Williams, who thought of himself as a complete Londoner, was sorry to leave the capital, but his wife was anxious to live in the country, and Dorking was within reasonably convenient reach of town. In 1932 Vaughan Williams was elected president of the English Folk Dance and Song Society . From September to December of that year he

1512-712: A musical treatment of John Bunyan 's allegory for forty-five years, and the 1951 "morality" was the final result. The reviews were respectful, but the work did not catch the opera-going public's imagination, and the Royal Opera House's production was "insultingly half-hearted" according to Frogley. The piece was revived the following year, but was still not a great success. Vaughan Williams commented to Ursula, "They don't like it, they won't like it, they don't want an opera with no heroine and no love duets—and I don't care, it's what I meant, and there it is." In February 1953 Vaughan Williams and Ursula were married. He left

1620-544: A nine-member Board of Directors. Three executive committees were established to administer Pop and Theatrical Music, Concert Music, and Media. BASCA then had four genre committees representing Songwriters, Classical, Jazz, and Media composers. BASCA became known as The Ivors Academy on 25 March 2019. The organization then moved in 2021 to a structure with a "senate" consisting of 40 songwriters and composers with committees relating to multiple genres and geographic regions. Members of The Ivors Academy include emerging songwriters and

1728-500: A number of tariffs for organisations in different sectors (businesses, government organisations, educational establishments, and so on). Dependent on their size and the extent to which each premises uses music, whether they are commercial premises or not, as well as other criteria, PRS for Music's tariffs vary. Around 350,000 UK businesses have paid and are licensed to play music under a PRS for Music licence, however some workplaces do not need one: In 2018, PPL and PRS for Music formed

1836-501: A payout of £605.1 m (up 14.7%). In 2007, PRS for Music took a Scottish car servicing company to court because the employees were allegedly "listening to the radio at work, allowing the music to be 'heard by colleagues and customers' " . In June 2008, PRS for Music accused Lancashire Constabulary of playing music at police stations not covered by a license, and sought an injunction and payments for damages. In 2014, PRS for Music and commercial broadcaster ITV failed to negotiate

1944-535: A progressive social outlook. Throughout his life he sought to be of service to his fellow citizens, and believed in making music as available as possible to everybody. He wrote many works for amateur and student performance. He was musically a late developer, not finding his true voice until his late thirties; his studies in 1907–1908 with the French composer Maurice Ravel helped him clarify the textures of his music and free it from Teutonic influences . Vaughan Williams

2052-517: A rustic idyll. Kennedy comments that it was not until after the Second World War that "the spectral 'Last Post' in the second movement and the girl's lamenting voice in the finale" were widely noticed and understood. The middle three symphonies are purely orchestral, and generally conventional in form, with sonata form (modified in places), specified home keys , and four-movement structure. The orchestral forces required are not large by

2160-453: A secret love affair for more than a decade. Ursula became the composer's muse, helper and London companion, and later helped him care for his ailing wife. Whether Adeline knew, or suspected, that Ursula and Vaughan Williams were lovers is uncertain, but the relations between the two women were of warm friendship throughout the years they knew each other. The composer's concern for his first wife never faltered, according to Ursula, who admitted in

2268-448: A symphonic valediction. William Glock wrote that it was "like the work of a distinguished poet who has nothing very new to say, but says it in exquisitely flowing language". The music Vaughan Williams wrote for the BBC to celebrate the end of the war, Thanksgiving for Victory , was marked by what the critic Edward Lockspeiser called the composer's characteristic avoidance of "any suggestion of rhetorical pompousness". Any suspicion that

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2376-478: A time. The critic Michael White suggests that Adeline "appears, in the most amicable way, to have adopted Ursula as her successor". Ursula recorded that during air raids all three slept in the same room in adjacent beds, holding hands for comfort. In 1943 Vaughan Williams conducted the premiere of his Fifth Symphony at the Proms . Its serene tone contrasted with the stormy Fourth, and led some commentators to think it

2484-431: Is "not remarkable for grace or politeness or inventive colour", but expresses "a consistent vision in which thought and feeling and their equivalent images in music never fall below a certain high level of natural distinction". They commented that the composer's vision is expressed in two main contrasting moods: "the one contemplative and trance-like, the other pugnacious and sinister". The first mood, generally predominant in

2592-486: Is a member of UK Music , an umbrella organisation that represents the collective interests of the production side of the UK's commercial music industry: artists, musicians, songwriters, composers, record labels, artist managers, music publishers, studio producers, and music collecting societies. In July 2016, songwriter Crispin Hunt became the chairman of the academy. Hunt was replaced by songwriter and composer Tom Gray as

2700-554: Is among the best-known British symphonists, noted for his very wide range of moods, from stormy and impassioned to tranquil, from mysterious to exuberant. Among the most familiar of his other concert works are Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis (1910) and The Lark Ascending (1914). His vocal works include hymns, folk-song arrangements and large-scale choral pieces. He wrote eight works for stage performance between 1919 and 1951. Although none of his operas became popular repertoire pieces, his ballet Job: A Masque for Dancing (1930)

2808-423: Is as a symphonist that Vaughan Williams is best known. The composer and academic Elliott Schwartz wrote (1964), "It may be said with truth that Vaughan Williams, Sibelius and Prokofieff are the symphonists of this century". Although Vaughan Williams did not complete the first of them until he was thirty-eight years old, the nine symphonies span nearly half a century of his creative life. In his 1964 analysis of

2916-483: Is played or performed publicly. MCPS also represents songwriters, composers and music publishers – representing their mechanical rights, and collects royalties whenever their music is reproduced as a physical product – this includes CDs, DVDs, digital downloads and broadcast or online. PRS (Performing Right Society) and MCPS (Mechanical Copyright Protection Society) are two separate collection societies with PRS running its own operations, providing services to MCPS under

3024-534: Is predominantly lighthearted in tone; it was received enthusiastically at its premiere in 1956, given by the Hallé Orchestra under the dedicatee, Sir John Barbirolli . The Ninth , premiered at a Royal Philharmonic Society concert conducted by Sir Malcolm Sargent in April 1958, puzzled critics with its sombre, questing tone, and did not immediately achieve the recognition it later gained. Having been in excellent health, Vaughan Williams died suddenly in

3132-535: The Norfolk Rhapsody No. 1 (1906). He remained unsatisfied with his technique as a composer. After unsuccessfully seeking lessons from Sir Edward Elgar , he contemplated studying with Vincent d'Indy in Paris. Instead, he was introduced by the critic and musicologist M.   D.   Calvocoressi to Maurice Ravel , a more modernist, less dogmatic musician than d'Indy. Ravel took few pupils, and

3240-625: The Serenade to Music (1938) for sixteen solo singers and orchestra; Flos Campi (1925) for solo viola, small orchestra, and small chorus; and his most important chamber work, in Howes's view—not purely instrumental but a song cycle— On Wenlock Edge (1909) with accompaniment for string quartet and piano. In 1955 the authors of The Record Guide , Edward Sackville-West and Desmond Shawe-Taylor , wrote that Vaughan Williams's music showed an exceptionally strong individual voice: Vaughan Williams's style

3348-637: The Sinfonia antartica (1952), a by-product of the composer's score for Scott of the Antarctic , has consistently divided critical opinion on whether it can be properly classed as a symphony. Alain Frogley in Grove argues that though the work can make a deep impression on the listener, it is neither a true symphony in the understood sense of the term nor a tone poem and is consequently the least successful of

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3456-734: The British Music Information Centre . In 1999, The Association of Professional Composers (APC) and the Composers' Guild of Great Britain (CGGB) merged into the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers, and Authors to provide a single, more powerful amalgamated organisation to represent its membership. The organization's current name was adopted in March 2009. Sir Tim Rice was elected first president, and Guy Fletcher and David Stoll served as joint chairs of

3564-687: The Copyright Act of 1911 . Mecolico licensed the mechanical rights within musical works and merged with the Copyright Protection Society in 1924. Phonographic Performance Limited (PPL) collected fees for playing gramophone recordings. Another agency, the British Copyright Protection Company or Britico was founded in 1932 by Alphonse Tournier, specialising on collecting royalties in the UK on French and German musical copyright, and becoming

3672-734: The Mechanical-Copyright Protection Society (MCPS) and the Performing Right Society (PRS). It undertakes collective rights management for musical works on behalf of its 175,000 members. PRS for Music was formed in 1997 following the MCPS-PRS Alliance. In 2009, PRS and MCPS-PRS Alliance realigned their brands and became PRS for Music. PRS represents their songwriter, composer and music publisher members’ performing rights, and collects royalties on their behalf whenever their music

3780-547: The 1930s there is an explicitly dark, even violent tone. The ballet Job: A Masque for Dancing (1930) and the Fourth Symphony (1935) surprised the public and critics. The discordant and violent tone of the symphony, written at a time of growing international tension, led many critics to suppose the symphony to be programmatic . Hubert Foss dubbed it "The Romantic" and Frank Howes called it "The Fascist". The composer dismissed such interpretations, and insisted that

3888-717: The 1980s that she had been jealous of Adeline, whose place in Vaughan Williams's life and affections was unchallengeable. During the Second World War Vaughan Williams was active in civilian war work, chairing the Home Office Committee for the Release of Interned Alien Musicians, helping Myra Hess with the organisation of the daily National Gallery concerts, serving on a committee for refugees from Nazi oppression, and on

3996-694: The Academy established the Gold Badge Awards (now Ivors Academy Honours ) for individuals who make outstanding contributions to Britain's music and entertainment industry, sponsored annually by PRS for Music . The organization also presents the British Composer Awards for excellence in classical and jazz music , also sponsored by the PRS for Music and in association with BBC Radio 3 . The Beatles have won 15 Ivor Novello Awards from

4104-486: The British Academy of Songwriters, Composers, and Authors. See also the List of awards and nominations received by The Beatles . BASCA established the fellowship in 1999, and it was first awarded in 2000. Fellows are: Ralph Vaughan Williams Ralph Vaughan Williams OM ( / ˌ r eɪ f v ɔː n ˈ w ɪ l j ə m z / RAYF vawn WIL -yəmz ; 12 October 1872   – 26 August 1958)

4212-564: The British Chambers of Commerce published a survey of business attitudes to PRS for Music. Just 6% of companies rated their experience as good or excellent. In contrast, over half said their experience had been poor or very poor. Businesses were also asked to submit comments about their experiences. Many of these replies referred to the PRS for Music's behaviour as "aggressive" and "threatening". In October 2009, PRS for Music apologised to

4320-661: The British Copyright Protection Association in 1962. This company, Britico, started to share computer facilities with PRS in 1970. PRS for Music administers the performance rights and mechanical rights of about 41 million musical works on behalf of its songwriters, composers and publishing members and in 2018 processed over 11.1 trillion uses of music. PRS for Music licenses and collects royalties for its members' musical works whenever they are publicly performed, or recordings of them are broadcast, streamed online or played in public spaces, both in

4428-770: The Council for the Encouragement of Music and the Arts (CEMA), the forerunner of the Arts Council . In 1940 he composed his first film score, for the propaganda film 49th Parallel . In 1942 Michael Wood died suddenly of heart failure. At Adeline's behest the widowed Ursula was invited to stay with the Vaughan Williamses in Dorking, and thereafter was a regular visitor there, sometimes staying for weeks at

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4536-677: The Dorking house and they took a lease of 10 Hanover Terrace , Regent's Park , London. It was the year of Queen Elizabeth II's coronation ; Vaughan Williams's contribution was an arrangement of the Old Hundredth psalm tune, and a new setting of "O taste and see" from Psalm 34 , performed at the service in Westminster Abbey . Having returned to live in London, Vaughan Williams, with Ursula's encouragement, became much more active socially and in pro bono publico activities. He

4644-489: The Fifth, composed when he was seventy, as a valedictory work, and the turbulent, troubled Sixth came as a shock. After violent orchestral clashes in the first movement, the obsessive ostinato of the second and the "diabolic" scherzo, the finale perplexed many listeners. Described as "one of the strangest journeys ever undertaken in music", it is marked pianissimo throughout its 10–12-minute duration. The seventh symphony,

4752-591: The Overture to The Wasps and A Sea Symphony . Vaughan Williams himself said that Ravel had helped him escape from "the heavy contrapuntal Teutonic manner". In the years between his return from Paris in 1908 and the outbreak of the First World War in 1914, Vaughan Williams increasingly established himself as a figure in British music. For a rising composer it was important to receive performances at

4860-716: The RCM; he remained on the faculty of the college for the next twenty years. In 1921 he succeeded Allen as conductor of the Bach Choir , London. It was not until 1922 that he produced a major new composition, A Pastoral Symphony ; the work was given its first performance in London in May conducted by Adrian Boult and its American premiere in June conducted by the composer. Throughout the 1920s Vaughan Williams continued to compose, conduct and teach. Kennedy lists forty works premiered during

4968-532: The UK and globally through its partner network. After operating costs are deducted, the remaining money is distributed to PRS for Music's songwriter, composer and publisher members and to affiliate societies. The principal sources of PRS for Music revenue collection are broadcasting (i.e. radio and television channels), public performance (i.e. music at gigs, concerts, theatres, restaurants, retailers and workplaces), online (i.e. music streamed online, digitally downloaded), and international. PRS for Music also has

5076-766: The United Kingdom's "most experienced and successful writers". A partial list of the past and present members includes David Arnold (fellow), Harrison Birtwistle , Peter Maxwell Davies (fellow), George Fenton , Guy Garvey , Howard Goodall , Diedrich Hartmann , Annie Lennox (fellow), Elton John (fellow), and Paul McCartney (fellow). Rolling Stones members Mick Jagger , and Keith Richards are members, as are Sting , Pete Townshend , Imogen Heap , David Gilmour , George Michael , Alex Turner , Chris Martin , Lynsey de Paul , Cathy Dennis , Kate Bush , Mika , Evelyn Glennie , Gary Barlow , Chrissie Hynde , Sharleen Spiteri , and Thom Yorke . The Ivors Academy

5184-568: The age of eighty-five. His works have continued to be a staple of the British concert repertoire, and all his major compositions and many of the minor ones have been recorded. Vaughan Williams was born at Down Ampney , Gloucestershire , the third child and younger son of the vicar , the Reverend Arthur Vaughan Williams (1834–1875), and his wife, Margaret, née Wedgwood (1842–1937). His paternal forebears were of mixed English and Welsh descent; many of them went into

5292-447: The best (as well as some of the worst) tunes in the world was a better musical education than any amount of sonatas and fugues". Always committed to music-making for the whole community, he helped found the amateur Leith Hill Musical Festival in 1905, and was appointed its principal conductor, a post he held until 1953. In 1903–1904 Vaughan Williams started collecting folk-songs . He had always been interested in them, and now followed

5400-660: The big provincial music festivals, which generated publicity and royalties. In 1910 his music featured at two of the largest and most prestigious festivals, with the premieres of the Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis at the Three Choirs Festival in Gloucester Cathedral in September and A Sea Symphony at the Leeds Festival the following month. The leading British music critics of

5508-454: The care of a nurse, Sara Wager, who instilled in them not only polite manners and good behaviour but also liberal social and philosophical opinions. Such views were consistent with the progressive-minded tradition of both sides of the family. When the young Vaughan Williams asked his mother about Darwin's controversial book On the Origin of Species , she answered, "The Bible says that God made

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5616-543: The chair of The Ivors Academy in February 2022. In the autumn of 2022, The Ivors Academy sponsored the 2021 Songwriters' Review in collaboration with music rights organisation Blokur . Singer-songwriter Olivia Rodrigo was announced as that year's leading songwriter. In 1955, The Songwriters' Guild of Great Britain established the Ivor Novello Awards to honour excellence in British music writing. In 1974,

5724-582: The composer as violinist. While at Charterhouse Vaughan Williams found that religion meant less and less to him, and for a while he was an atheist . This softened into "a cheerful agnosticism ", and he continued to attend church regularly to avoid upsetting the family. His views on religion did not affect his love of the Authorised Version of the Bible , the beauty of which, in the words of his widow Ursula Vaughan Williams in her 1964 biography of

5832-747: The composer's output, was more popular, as audiences preferred "the stained-glass beauty of the Tallis Fantasia, the direct melodic appeal of the Serenade to Music , the pastoral poetry of The Lark Ascending , and the grave serenity of the Fifth Symphony". By contrast, as in the ferocity of the Fourth and Sixth Symphonies and the Concerto for Two Pianos: "in his grimmer moods Vaughan Williams can be as frightening as Sibelius and Bartók ". It

5940-494: The composer, remained "one of his essential companions through life." In this, as in many other things in his life, he was, according to his biographer Michael Kennedy , "that extremely English product the natural nonconformist with a conservative regard for the best tradition". In July 1890 Vaughan Williams left Charterhouse and in September he was enrolled as a student at the Royal College of Music (RCM), London. After

6048-595: The cross-licensing agreements formed by 24 collecting societies in Europe were in violation of anti-competition laws. Along with Phonographic Performance Limited (PPL), PRS for Music use the Centre for Education and Finance Management (CEFM) as agents to collect licensing money from schools and colleges. Universities have separate arrangements. In 2008, PRS for Music began a concerted drive to make commercial premises pay for annual "performance" licences. In one case it told

6156-453: The deaths of Elgar, Delius and Holst in 1934. Holst's death was a severe personal and professional blow to Vaughan Williams; the two had been each other's closest friends and musical advisers since their college days. After Holst's death Vaughan Williams was glad of the advice and support of other friends including Boult and the composer Gerald Finzi , but his relationship with Holst was irreplaceable. In some of Vaughan Williams's music of

6264-475: The decade were a cello concerto and a new opera, Thomas the Rhymer . The predominant works of the 1950s were his three last symphonies. The seventh—officially unnumbered, and titled Sinfonia antartica —divided opinion; the score is a reworking of music Vaughan Williams had written for the 1948 film Scott of the Antarctic , and some critics thought it not truly symphonic. The Eighth , though wistful in parts,

6372-567: The decade, including the Mass in G minor (1922), the ballet Old King Cole (1923), the operas Hugh the Drover and Sir John in Love (1924 and 1928), the suite Flos Campi (1925) and the oratorio Sancta Civitas (1925). During the decade Adeline became increasingly immobilised by arthritis, and the numerous stairs in their London house finally caused the Vaughan Williamses to move in 1929 to

6480-401: The early hours of 26 August 1958 at Hanover Terrace, aged 85. Two days later, after a private funeral at Golders Green , he was cremated. On 19 September, at a crowded memorial service, his ashes were interred near the burial plots of Purcell and Stanford in the north choir aisle of Westminster Abbey. Michael Kennedy characterises Vaughan Williams's music as a strongly individual blending of

6588-454: The early works of Stravinsky which were soon to follow. A London Symphony (1911–1913) which the composer later observed might more accurately be called a "symphony by a Londoner", is for the most part not overtly pictorial in its presentation of London. Vaughan Williams insisted that it is "self-expressive, and must stand or fall as 'absolute' music". There are some references to the urban soundscape: brief impressions of street music, with

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6696-567: The event. The degree to which the French composer influenced the Englishman's style is debated. Ravel declared Vaughan Williams to be "my only pupil who does not write my music"; nevertheless, commentators including Kennedy, Adams, Hugh Ottaway and Alain Frogley find Vaughan Williams's instrumental textures lighter and sharper in the music written after his return from Paris, such as the String Quartet in G minor, On Wenlock Edge ,

6804-464: The example of a recent generation of enthusiasts such as Cecil Sharp and Lucy Broadwood in going into the English countryside noting down and transcribing songs traditionally sung in various locations. Collections of the songs were published, preserving many that could otherwise have vanished as oral traditions died out. Vaughan Williams incorporated some into his own compositions, and more generally

6912-428: The first Vice Chair, and Chairman in 1948, and again between 1954 and 1958. The Association of Professional Composers was founded in 1976 by George Fenton to represent composers of film and TV music. In 1958 the Composers' Guild of Great Britain began publishing the journal Composer , and also published a number of catalogues of available works. In 1967 the organisation, under the direction of Ruth Gipps , established

7020-629: The first decade of the century. He wrote articles for musical journals and for the second edition of Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians , edited the first volume of Purcell's Welcome Songs for the Purcell Society , and was for a while involved in adult education in the University Extension Lectures. From 1904 to 1906 he was music editor of a new hymn-book, The English Hymnal , of which he later said, "I now know that two years of close association with some of

7128-482: The first version of the Fifth Symphony was completed. In 1938 Vaughan Williams met Ursula Wood (1911–2007), the wife of an army officer, Captain (later Lieutenant-Colonel) Michael Forrester Wood. She was a poet, and had approached the composer with a proposed scenario for a ballet. Despite their both being married, and a four-decade age-gap, they fell in love almost from their first meeting; they maintained

7236-507: The following year. After leaving the university he returned to complete his training at the RCM. Parry had by then succeeded Sir George Grove as director of the college, and Vaughan Williams's new professor of composition was Charles Villiers Stanford . Relations between teacher and student were stormy but affectionate. Stanford, who had been adventurous in his younger days, had grown deeply conservative; he clashed vigorously with his modern-minded pupil. Vaughan Williams had no wish to follow in

7344-509: The great English choral tradition, which Tallis passed on to Byrd , Byrd to Gibbons , Gibbons to Purcell , Purcell to Battishill and Greene , and they in their turn through the Wesleys, to Parry. He has passed on the torch to us and it is our duty to keep it alight. Vaughan Williams's family would have preferred him to have remained at Charterhouse for two more years and then go on to Cambridge University . They were not convinced that he

7452-466: The law or the Church . The judges Sir Edward and Sir Roland Vaughan Williams were respectively Arthur's father and brother. Margaret Vaughan Williams was a great-granddaughter of Josiah Wedgwood and niece of Charles Darwin . Arthur Vaughan Williams died suddenly in February 1875, and his widow took the children to live in her family home, Leith Hill Place, Wotton, Surrey . The children were under

7560-402: The marriage. In 1899 Vaughan Williams passed the examination for the degree of Doctor of Music at Cambridge; the title was formally conferred on him in 1901. The song "Linden Lea" became the first of his works to appear in print, published in the magazine The Vocalist in April 1902 and then as separate sheet music. In addition to composition he occupied himself in several capacities during

7668-434: The mature symphonies. The work is in five movements, with wordless vocal lines for female chorus and solo soprano in the first and last movements. In addition to large woodwind and percussion sections the score features a prominent part for wind machine . PRS for Music PRS for Music Limited (formerly The MCPS-PRS Alliance Limited ) is a British music copyright collective , made up of two collection societies:

7776-725: The modal harmonies familiar from folk‐song with the French influence of Ravel and Debussy. The basis of his work is melody, his rhythms, in Kennedy's view, being unsubtle at times. Vaughan Williams's music is often described as visionary; Kennedy cites the masque Job and the Fifth and Ninth Symphonies. Vaughan Williams's output was prolific and wide-ranging. For the voice he composed songs, operas, and choral works ranging from simpler pieces suitable for amateurs to demanding works for professional choruses. His comparatively few chamber works are not among his better-known compositions. Some of his finest works elude conventional categorisation, such as

7884-549: The music already written for it into a new symphony. Despite the internal tensions caused by the deliberate conflict of modality in places, the work is generally serene in character, and was particularly well received for the comfort it gave at a time of all-out war. Neville Cardus later wrote, "The Fifth Symphony contains the most benedictory and consoling music of our time." With the Sixth Symphony (1948) Vaughan Williams once again confounded expectations. Many had seen

7992-521: The music they play, and music has been on the radio for many years. During the war, there were programmes like Workers Playtime and Music While You Work . Now, many radio stations have features about workplaces. If the PRS force people to switch their radios off then how are these stations going to survive? Music has to be heard before people go out and buy it. In March 2009, the on line video-sharing site YouTube removed all premium music videos for UK users, even those supplied by record labels , due to

8100-452: The name PRS for Music. As of 2018 PRS has entered a joint venture with Phonographic Performance Limited (PPL) under a newly formed private company called PPL PRS Ltd with the aim of making it easier for their customers to obtain a music licence. The Performing Right Society was founded in 1914 by a group of music publishers, to protect the value of copyright and to help provide an income for composers, songwriters and music publishers. At

8208-502: The network of pubs, clubs and live music venues. Those honoured include Squeeze , Elton John , Pulp , Queen and UB40 . In May 2016, PRS for Music announced its 2015 financial results, which showed an 8.4% increase in distributions to its songwriter members. The figures for 2016 were announced in May 2017 showing that revenues increased by 10.1% and royalty payments to its members increased to £527.6 m (up 11.1%). The organisation reported record royalty distributions in 2017, with

8316-431: The nine, Schwartz found it striking that no two of the symphonies are alike, either in structure or in mood. Commentators have found it useful to consider the nine in three groups of three—early, middle and late. The first three symphonies, to which Vaughan Williams assigned titles rather than numbers, form a sub-group within the nine, having programmatic elements absent from the later six. A Sea Symphony (1910),

8424-505: The only one of the series to include a part for full choir, differs from most earlier choral symphonies in that the choir sings in all the movements. The extent to which it is a true symphony has been debated; in a 2013 study, Alain Frogley describes it as a hybrid work, with elements of symphony, oratorio and cantata. Its sheer length—about eighty minutes—was unprecedented for an English symphonic work, and within its thoroughly tonal construction it contains harmonic dissonances that pre-echo

8532-762: The only post he ever held for an annual salary was as a church organist and choirmaster. He held the position at St Barnabas, in the inner London district of South Lambeth , from 1895 to 1899 for a salary of £50 a year. He disliked the job, but working closely with a choir was valuable experience for his later undertakings. In October 1897 Adeline and Vaughan Williams were married. They honeymooned for several months in Berlin, where he studied with Max Bruch . On their return they settled in London, originally in Westminster and, from 1905, in Chelsea . There were no children of

8640-754: The outbreak of the First World War in August. Joining the Royal Army Medical Corps as a private , he served as a stretcher bearer in an ambulance crew in France and later in Greece. Frogley writes of this period that Vaughan Williams was considerably older than most of his comrades, and "the back-breaking labour of dangerous night-time journeys through mud and rain must have been more than usually punishing". The war left its emotional mark on Vaughan Williams, who lost many comrades and friends, including

8748-764: The philosophers G. E. Moore and Bertrand Russell , the historian G. M. Trevelyan and the musician Hugh Allen . He felt intellectually overshadowed by some of his companions, but he learned much from them and formed lifelong friendships with several. Among the women with whom he mixed socially at Cambridge was Adeline Fisher, the daughter of Herbert Fisher , an old friend of the Vaughan Williams family. She and Vaughan Williams grew close, and in June 1897, after he had left Cambridge, they became engaged to be married. During his time at Cambridge Vaughan Williams continued his weekly lessons with Parry, and studied composition with Charles Wood and organ with Alan Gray . He graduated as Bachelor of Music in 1894 and Bachelor of Arts

8856-469: The piano, and was pleased to begin violin lessons the following year. In 1880, when he was eight, he took a correspondence course in music from Edinburgh University and passed the associated examinations. In September 1883 he went as a boarder to Field House preparatory school in Rottingdean on the south coast of England, forty miles (64 km) from Wotton. He was generally happy there, although he

8964-496: The septuagenarian composer had settled into benign tranquillity was dispelled by his Sixth Symphony (1948), described by the critic Gwyn Parry-Jones as "one of the most disturbing musical statements of the 20th century", opening with a "primal scream, plunging the listener immediately into a world of aggression and impending chaos." Coming as it did near the start of the Cold War , many critics thought its pianissimo last movement

9072-433: The sound of the barrel organ mimicked by the orchestra; the characteristic chant of the lavender-seller; the jingle of hansom cabs ; and the chimes of Big Ben played by harp and clarinet. But commentators have heard—and the composer never denied or confirmed—some social comment in sinister echoes at the end of the scherzo and an orchestral outburst of pain and despair at the opening of the finale. Schwartz comments that

9180-497: The standards of the first half of the 20th century, although the Fourth calls for an augmented woodwind section and the Sixth includes a part for tenor saxophone . The Fourth Symphony (1935) astonished listeners with its striking dissonance, far removed from the prevailing quiet tone of the previous symphony. The composer firmly contradicted any notions that the work was programmatical in any respect, and Kennedy calls attempts to give

9288-474: The sun from the lowest note of the double bassoon to the philosophy of Jude the Obscure ". In 1949 he wrote of their relationship, "Holst declared that his music was influenced by that of his friend: the converse is certainly true." Vaughan Williams had a modest private income, which in his early career he supplemented with a variety of musical activities. Although the organ was not his preferred instrument,

9396-500: The symphony "definitely places a new figure in the first rank of our English composers". Between these successes and the start of war Vaughan Williams's largest-scale work was the first version of A London Symphony (1914). In the same year he wrote The Lark Ascending in its original form for violin and piano. Despite his age—he was approaching forty-two in October—Vaughan Williams volunteered for military service on

9504-464: The symphony draws little on the folk-songs beloved of the composer, and the pastoral landscape evoked is not a tranquil English scene, but the French countryside ravaged by war. Some English musicians who had not fought in the First World War misunderstood the work and heard only the slow tempi and quiet tone, failing to notice the character of a requiem in the music and mistaking the piece for

9612-401: The symphony, in its "unified presentation of widely heterogeneous elements", is "very much like the city itself". Vaughan Williams said in his later years that this was his favourite of the symphonies. The last of the first group is A Pastoral Symphony (1921). The first three movements are for orchestra alone; a wordless solo soprano or tenor voice is added in the finale. Despite the title

9720-401: The time, J. A. Fuller Maitland of The Times and Samuel Langford of The Manchester Guardian , were strong in their praise. The former wrote of the fantasia, "The work is wonderful because it seems to lift one into some unknown region of musical thought and feeling. Throughout its course one is never sure whether one is listening to something very old or very new". Langford declared that

9828-709: The time, PRS collected fees for live performance from sheet music . PRS was distinct from both the activities of the Mechanical-Copyright Protection Society which was founded in 1910, and the Phonographic Performance Limited (PPL) , founded in 1934 by Decca and EMI . The Mechanical-Copyright Protection Society began as Mecolico, the Mechanical Copyright Licenses Company, which was founded in 1910 in anticipation of

9936-426: The traditions of Stanford's idols, Brahms and Wagner , and he stood up to his teacher as few students dared to do. Beneath Stanford's severity lay a recognition of Vaughan Williams's talent and a desire to help the young man correct his opaque orchestration and extreme predilection for modal music . In his second spell at the RCM (1895–1896) Vaughan Williams got to know a fellow student, Gustav Holst , who became

10044-437: The value of music creators and education. The campaign was supported by acclaimed songwriters and composers including Jimmy Napes , Michael Price , Crispin Hunt, Gary Clark and Debbie Wiseman . The PRS for Music Heritage Award scheme launched in 2009 with the first award going to Blur . Ceremonial plaques are unveiled to honour the performance birthplaces of legendary bands, artists and songwriters - as well as recognising

10152-414: The work "a meretricious programme ... a poor compliment to its musical vitality and self-sufficiency". The Fifth Symphony (1943) was in complete contrast to its predecessor. Vaughan Williams had been working on and off for many years on his operatic version of Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress . Fearing—wrongly as it turned out—that the opera would never be completed, Vaughan Williams reworked some of

10260-515: The work was absolute music , with no programme of any kind; nonetheless, some of those close to him, including Foss and Boult, remained convinced that something of the troubled spirit of the age was captured in the work. As the decade progressed, Vaughan Williams found musical inspiration lacking, and experienced his first fallow period since his wartime musical silence. After his anti-war cantata Dona nobis pacem in 1936 he did not complete another work of substantial length until late in 1941, when

10368-423: The world in six days. Great Uncle Charles thinks it took longer: but we need not worry about it, for it is equally wonderful either way". In 1878, at the age of five, Vaughan Williams began receiving piano lessons from his aunt, Sophy Wedgwood. He displayed signs of musical talent early on, composing his first piece of music, a four-bar piano piece called "The Robin's Nest", in the same year. He did not greatly like

10476-873: The young composer George Butterworth . In 1917 Vaughan Williams was commissioned as a lieutenant in the Royal Artillery , seeing action in France from March 1918. The continual noise of the guns damaged his hearing, and led to deafness in his later years. After the armistice in 1918 he served as director of music for the British First Army until demobilised in February 1919. During the war Vaughan Williams stopped writing music, and after returning to civilian life he took some time before feeling ready to compose new works. He revised some earlier pieces, and turned his attention to other musical activities. In 1919 he accepted an invitation from Hugh Allen, who had succeeded Parry as director, to teach composition at

10584-635: Was a leading figure in the Society for the Promotion of New Music , and in 1956 he set up and endowed the RVW Trust to support young composers and promote new or neglected music. He and his wife travelled extensively in Europe, and in 1954 he visited the US once again, having been invited to lecture at Cornell and other universities and to conduct. He received an enthusiastic welcome from large audiences, and

10692-436: Was an English composer. His works include operas, ballets, chamber music, secular and religious vocal pieces and orchestral compositions including nine symphonies, written over sixty years. Strongly influenced by Tudor music and English folk-song , his output marked a decisive break in British music from its German-dominated style of the 19th century. Vaughan Williams was born to a well-to-do family with strong moral views and

10800-525: Was confirmed the new hub would be called 'ICE'. In February 2016, PRS for Music and PPL, the body who licenses the sound recording of a song, confirmed plans to create a new joint venture for public performance licensing. The new joint venture would focus on servicing all UK public performance licensing customers. The joint venture launched in 2018. In July 2015, PRS for Music launched a pro-creator campaign called Streamfair. The campaign focused on four areas, Copyright Legislation, Online Licensing, Promoting

10908-476: Was established in 2000 between five European collecting societies including the UK's PRS for Music, France's SACEM , and Germany's GEMA . The agreement allows each collecting society to collect royalties on behalf of members of the other collecting society, e.g. PRS for Music would collect money for German artists listed with GEMA, but to restrict licences to be sold only within the member organisation's home country. The European Commission decided in 2008 that

11016-432: Was in the US as a visiting lecturer at Bryn Mawr College , Pennsylvania. The texts of his lectures were published under the title National Music in 1934; they sum up his artistic and social credo more fully than anything he had published previously, and remained in print for most of the remainder of the century. During the 1930s Vaughan Williams came to be regarded as a leading figure in British music, particularly after

11124-486: Was influenced by their prevailing modal forms. This, together with his love of Tudor and Stuart music, helped shape his compositional style for the rest of his career. Over this period Vaughan Williams composed steadily, producing songs, choral music, chamber works and orchestral pieces, gradually finding the beginnings of his mature style. His compositions included the tone poem In the Fen Country (1904) and

11232-485: Was known as a demanding taskmaster for those he agreed to teach. Vaughan Williams spent three months in Paris in the winter of 1907–1908, working with him four or five times each week. There is little documentation of Vaughan Williams's time with Ravel; the musicologist Byron Adams advises caution in relying on Vaughan Williams's recollections in the Musical Autobiography written forty-three years after

11340-636: Was overwhelmed at the warmth of his reception. Kennedy describes it as "like a musical state occasion". Of Vaughan Williams's works from the 1950s, Grove makes particular mention of Three Shakespeare Songs (1951) for unaccompanied chorus, the Christmas cantata Hodie (1953–1954), the Violin Sonata, and, most particularly, the Ten Blake Songs (1957) for voice and oboe, "a masterpiece of economy and precision". Unfinished works from

11448-500: Was shocked to encounter for the first time social snobbery and political conservatism, which were rife among his fellow pupils. From there he moved on to the public school Charterhouse in January 1887. His academic and sporting achievements there were satisfactory, and the school encouraged his musical development. In 1888 he organised a concert in the school hall, which included a performance of his G major Piano Trio (now lost) with

11556-491: Was successful and has been frequently staged. Two episodes made notably deep impressions in Vaughan Williams's personal life. The First World War , in which he served in the army, had a lasting emotional effect. Twenty years later, though in his sixties and devotedly married, he was reinvigorated by a love affair with a much younger woman, who later became his second wife. He went on composing through his seventies and eighties, producing his last symphony months before his death at

11664-417: Was talented enough to pursue a musical career, but feeling it would be wrong to prevent him from trying, they had allowed him to go to the RCM. Nevertheless, a university education was expected of him, and in 1892 he temporarily left the RCM and entered Trinity College, Cambridge , where he spent three years, studying music and history. Among those with whom Vaughan Williams became friendly at Cambridge were

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