Symphony No. 8 (Vaughan Williams) Symphony No. 8 (Vaughan Williams) Ralph Vaughan Williams' Symphony No. 8 in D minor was composed between 1953 and 1955. It was the first of his symphonies which Vaughan Williams numbered. Sir John Barbirolli conducted the premiere of the piece on 2 May 1956, with the Hallé Orchestra. The Eighth Symphony is the shortest of Vaughan Williams' nine symphonies, with a typical performance taking just under a half hour, yet it is remarkably inventive, especially in the composer's experiments in sonority. Not only does he use a much-expanded percussion section, including "all the 'phones and 'spiels known to the composer"
Ralph Vaughan Williams piano. Despite his age—he was forty-two in 1914—Vaughan Williams volunteered for military service on the outbreak of the First World War. Joining the Royal Army Medical Corps as a private, he drove ambulance wagons 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 the young composer George Butterworth. In 1917 Vaughan Williams