Alan Helsdon writes:
“We do not know all the details of why Ralph Vaughan Williams, aged 32, went to King’s Lynn in the second week of 1905 but there are a few clues.
Michael Holyoake writes, ‘A highly significant musical development occured around 1893 when he obtained a copy of the recently published English County Songs.’ This was compiled by Lucy Broadwood who took over as Secretary of the Folk Song Society in 1904 and who was a close friend of Vaughan Williams and a leading light in the early days of the Society.
Mike Yates writes ‘It was thought, at the time, that folksongs were almost a thing of the past, and so the Society published an annual journal of songs that were being collected (‘saved for posterity’) by Society members. However, within a few years, the Society was moribund and on the brink of collapse. Indeed, the Folk-Song Society would probably have disappeared had Lucy Broadwood not been elected the Society’s Secretary in 1904. Together with Ralph Vaughan Williams and the folksong collector Cecil Sharp, Lucy Broadwood completely revitalised the Society. She also became the editor of the Society’s Journal and was responsible for some of the most important song collections to appear.’
In the first (1899) Journal of the new Folk Song Society the first Secretary, Mrs Kate Lee, reported how she had gone to Wells in north Norfolk in 1897 and been told by some local fishermen that ‘she had much better go to Sheringham or Cromer’ for some songs worth hearing. It seems reasonable to assume Vaughan Williams read this after joining the Society in May 1904 and being elected to the Committee in June that year. This could have aroused his interest in Norfolk, a place he’d never been to before January 1905.”
Song’s Collected King’s Lynn North End
King’s Lynn North End, 9th January 1905
King’s Lynn North End 10th – 11th January 1905
King’s Lynn North End, 13th – 14th January 1905
King’s Lynn North End, 1st September 1906
Songs Collected King’s Lynn Union
King’s Lynn Union, 9th, 10th 11th January 1905 & 1st September 1906
