Symphony No. 5 (Vaughan Williams)

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Symphony No. 5 by English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams was written between 1938 and 1943. In style it represents a shift away from the violent dissonance of the Fourth Symphony, and a return to the more romantic style of the earlier Pastoral Symphony.

Many of the musical themes in the Fifth Symphony stem from Vaughan Williams' then-unfinished operatic work, The Pilgrim's Progress. This opera, or "morality" as Vaughan Williams preferred to call it, had been in gestation for decades, and the composer had temporarily abandoned it at the time the symphony was conceived. Despite its origins, the symphony is without programmatic context, and is in the form of an extended development of musical themes taken from the morality rather than an attempt to cast it directly into symphonic form.

Although nominally in the key of D major, large parts of the Fifth are in fact in C major, or simultaneously in C and D. Further confusing the issue, early piano scores described the work as being in the key of G. The symphony is scored for two flutes (one doubling piccolo), oboe, cor anglais, two clarinets, two bassoons, two French horns, two trumpets, three trombones, timpani and strings. The dedication reads, "To Jean Sibelius, without permission."

Vaughan Williams did not number his symphonies as he composed them (he referred to them only by title or key) until the appearance of the Ninth, which is in the same key as the Sixth. At that point he assigned numbers to them, beginning with the F minor, in order to avoid confusion. The first three are as well known by their titles as by their numbers.

The Fifth Symphony is structured in fairly typical four-movement form.

1. Preludio. The symphony opens with a distinctive horn call in D major, from which the key of the symphony as a whole is taken. Several of the musical themes in this movement are taken from Act I Scene I of The Pilgrim's Progress, particularly the opening dialogue between Pilgrim and Evangelist. A "Dresden Amen" theme appears towards the close of this movement.
2. Scherzo. This short movement is marked by a galloping, dance-like rhythm punctuated with a series of raucous blasts from the woodwind and brass. It concludes with a feathery motif of rising 4ths.
3. Romanza. The primary themes in this movement are borrowed from the opening of Act I Scene 2 of The Pilgrim's Progress ("The House Beautiful"). The opening cor anglais solo is taken virtually without change. Pilgrim's lyric sung to this melody, "He hath given me rest by his sorrow and life by his death", was originally used by Vaughan Williams as an inscription on this movement; while the contrasting agitated theme of the central section is taken from Pilgrim's lyric, "Save me! Save me, Lord! My burden is greater than I can bear". Rising fourths again appear as connecting passages. This movement might well be considered the spiritual core of the symphony.
4. Passacaglia. Although this movement begins with the repetitive bass line characteristic of the passacaglia form, Vaughan Williams eventually abandons it. The triumphant primary melody of the passacaglia comes from Pilgrim's dialogue with Interpreter in the second half of "The House Beautiful" scene, while the fanfare motif recalls of "The Arming of the Pilgrim" in Act II Scene 1. This ushers in a return of the themes from the first movement of the symphony, which are resolved into a quiet valediction played first by the woodwind and then by the upper strings.

The Fifth Symphony was premiered on June 24, 1943 at a Proms Concert in the Royal Albert Hall in London by the London Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by the composer.