Vaughan Williams’s closest musical friend for four decades was Gustav Holst: over the years they spent many ‘field days’ together going through their new pieces, criticising them and making suggestions about improvements. It was a remarkable friendship and Vaughan Williams came to rely on Holst, trusting him completely. ‘Field days’ on Job were particularly intensive, and Vaughan Williams must have been delighted that Holst considered it to be his friend’s finest work to date. Holst wrote to his daughter Imogen on 16 February 1931 (after hearing the broadcast premiere on 13 February conducted by Vaughan Williams in a concert that also included Boult’s performance of Sāvitri): ‘I had two rehearsals and performance of RVW’s Job on Friday. It’s one of his best things.’ A year later (4 January 1932), Holst wrote to Fritz Hart, an old friend and former classmate at the RCM who moved to Australia in 1908, enclosing a copy of the piano score of ‘the most important work of any composer I know in the last 18 months – Job. It is probably his masterpiece.’ In his ‘Musical Autobiography’ Vaughan Williams emphasised how valuable Holst’s advice had been:

The first performance of Job was conducted by Vaughan Williams at the Norwich Festival on 23 October 1930 (as part of a concert that began with the British premiere of Janáček’s Glagolitic Mass, conducted by Henry Wood), given by the Queen’s Hall Orchestra in St Andrew’s Hall, Norwich. On that occasion Job was described in the programme as ‘a pageant for dancing’, and the end of the note stated that ‘Job was originally intended for stage representation.