Editing Constant Lambert (section)

==Later career==
[[File:Christopher-Wood-Portrait-of-Constant-Lambert-1927.jpg|thumb|Portrait of Constant Lambert, painting by [[Christopher Wood (painter)|Christopher Wood]], 1927.]]
Lambert was appointed in 1931 as conductor and music director of the Vic-Wells ballet (later [[The Royal Ballet]]),<ref name="ROH bio"/> but his career as a composer stagnated.  His major choral work ''[[Summer's Last Will and Testament (Lambert)|Summer's Last Will and Testament]]'' (1935, after [[Summer's Last Will and Testament|the play of the same name]] by [[Thomas Nashe]]), one of his most emotionally dark works, proved unfashionable in the mood following the death of [[George V|King George V]], but [[Alan Frank]] hailed it at the time as Lambert's "finest work".<ref>{{cite journal | last=Frank | first=Alan | title=The Music of Constant Lambert | journal=The Musical Times | volume=78 | issue=1137 | pages=941–945 |date=November 1937 | doi=10.2307/923287 | jstor=923287 }}</ref>

The Second World War took its toll on his vitality and creativity. He was ruled unfit for active service in the armed forces; decades of hard drinking had impaired his health, which declined further with the development of [[Diabetes mellitus|diabetes]] that remained undiagnosed and untreated until very late in his life. Lambert's childhood experiences (which included a near-fatal bout of septicaemia) had given him a lifelong detestation and fear of the medical profession.

Lambert himself considered he had failed as a composer, and completed only two major works after the disappointment of ''Summer's Last Will and Testament'' - they were the ballet scores ''Horoscope'' (1938) and ''[[Tiresias (ballet)|Tiresias]]'' (1951) - though there were also several smaller works, such as the white-note piano four hands suite ''Trois pièces nègres pour les touches blanches'', written for the identical twin piano duo [[Mary and Geraldine Peppin]].<ref>Motion Andrew (1996). [https://books.google.com/books?id=I9U7C_Ej9LkC&q=Peppin&pg=PR2-IA102 ''The Lamberts. George, Constant and Kit''].</ref> Instead he concentrated mostly on conducting, working closely with the Royal Ballet until his resignation in 1947. He continued to be featured as a guest conductor until shortly before his death in 1951.<ref name="ROH bio"/>