Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872-1958) was an influential British composer and folk-song collector. His powerful and expressive orchestral music is notable for its very “English” sound. His early adventures collecting folk songs in the English countryside profoundly influenced his later compositions. Along with Gustav Holst and Percy Grainger, his works for wind band form part of the foundation for the serious literature in that medium.
Rhosymedre was originally the second in the collection Three Preludes on Welsh Hymn Tunes that Vaughan Williams composed and published in 1920. It takes an original hymn tune (also called “Rhosymedre” and sets it as a calm, somewhat meandering prelude. It is a favorite of organists and British Royals: the organ version was played at the funeral of Princess Diana and the later weddings of both of her sons, Prince William and Prince Harry. Walter Beeler arranged Rhosymedre for band in 1972, offering some commentary:
In 1920 Ralph Vaughan Williams composed three preludes for organ based on Welsh hymn tunes, a set that quickly established itself in the organ repertoire. Of the three, Rhosymedre, sometimes known as “Lovely,” has become the most popular. The hymn tune used in this prelude was written by a 19th century Welsh composer, J.D. Edwards, and is a very simple melody made up almost entirely of scale tones and upbeat skips of a fourth. Yet, around this modest tune Vaughan Williams has constructed a piece of grand proportions, with a broad arc that soars with the gradual rise of the tune itself.
The hymn tune in long values is surrounded by a moving bass line and a treble obbligato in faster notes often characterized by descending sixths. Vaughan Williams has joined together hymn tune, bass, and obbligato in such a way as to create an exceedingly fresh and ingratiating tonal language, which seems all the more remarkable when one discovers from the score that there is scarcely an accidental in the entire piece.
Beeler’s concert band version:
Vaughan Williams’s organ version:
And the original hymn on piano, with score:
The concert band version is featured at J. W. Pepper and the Wind Repertory Project. See more about the original hymn at Wikipedia and Hymnary.org.
The Ralph Vaughan Williams Society – the source for anything you might ever possibly want to know about the composer.