Vaughan Williams's Five Variants of "Dives and Lazarus" for Strings and Harp were given their first performance in New York in 1939, conducted by Sir Adrian Boult during the World's Fair. This performance also comes from New York, given by the CBS Radio Orchestra on 7 February 1954 under the direction of Leopold Stokowski. He was a fellow student of Vaughan Williams at the Royal College of Music in the 1890s and a long-time champion of the composer's music.