Aug 14: "The Lark Ascending" #1: Vaughan Williams & KES

"The art of music above all other arts is the expression of the soul of a nation"

Ralph Vaughan Williams

Richard King's 2019 book explores British music and its link with the landscape of Britain.

I have a copy of the book and enjoyed reading it when it first came out. I've mentioned it previously on the blog.

I've now revisited it for this blog and there is plenty of relevance to the blog's theme, so there will be a number of posts to follow through the next month or so.

Vaughan Williams is referenced in the prologue and his quote that "Folk music is not a cause of national music, it is a manifestation of it'.

He wrote 'The Lark Ascending' which was premiered in 1920 having been started at the outbreak of the Great War.

It was premiered near Bristol.

Vaughan Williams believed that music was a latent force in all people... "the only means of artistic expression which is natural to everybody."

The soundtrack to the Ken Loach film 'KES' (from Barry Hines' book) has a wonderful soundtrack by John Cameron.

"Kes flies higher" has a link to 'The Lark Ascending' in its structure and feel...

Chapter 1 of the book explores the piece in more detail.

It epitomises an idea of place, and because there are no lyrics it hasn't been (mis)interpreted as Blake's 'Jerusalem' has been.

It invokes a reverie: a country dance observed by a bird in flight, "a lyrical expression of grace and freedom".

King says that Vaughan Williams "achieves a synthesis of air and earth as the skylark shares in the merrymaking taking place below and the intoxicating sense of euphoria is absolute."

Vaughan Williams described folk songs as "an individual flowering on a common stem".