Serenade to Music is an orchestral concert work completed in 1938 by English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams, written as a tribute to conductor Sir Henry Wood.
[3][4] On 15 October 1938, Wood made the first recording (with the same soloists and the BBC Symphony Orchestra) at the HMV Abbey Road Studio No.
Vaughan Williams and HMV donated copyright fees received from the initial record sales to the Henry Wood Jubilee Fund, which was established to endow London hospital beds for British orchestral musicians.
[6] The orchestra consists of two flutes (second doubling piccolo), oboe, cor anglais, two clarinets, two bassoons, four horns, two trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion, harp, and strings.
Vaughan Williams conducted a performance of the original version of the Serenade during the inaugural concerts at the new Royal Festival Hall in 1951.
The soloists were Adele Addison, Lucine Amara, Eileen Farrell, Lili Chookasian, Jennie Tourel, Shirley Verrett-Carter, Charles Bressler, Richard Tucker, Jon Vickers, George London, Ezio Flagello and Donald Bell.
HN Look how the floor of heaven Is thick inlaid with patines of bright gold: FT There's not the smallest orb that thou behold'st But in his motion like an angel sings, WW Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubins; Such harmony is in immortal souls; PJ But whilst this muddy vesture of decay Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it.
The wholly orchestral version has been recorded by the London Philharmonic under Vernon Handley and the Northern Sinfonia of England under Richard Hickox.
The Serenade to Music figures prominently in No Distance Left to Run, a 2010 documentary film about the British rock band Blur.