of his music given in 1939, The Times said, "As a general description, 'Good, but a little dry' might be justly applied to Jacob's work". In the 1920s and 1930s Jacob composed music for choral societies and school choirs, which provided a steady income, in between more ambitious compositions. From his works of the 1920s, Wetherell singles out a viola concerto (1926), a piano concerto followed (1927) and the First Symphony (1929) dedicated to the memory of Jacob's favourite brother who was killed in the First World War. Large-scale works from the 1930s include an oboe concerto for Léon Goossens (1935) and Variations on an Original Theme (1937) In the 1930s Jacob, along with several other young composers, wrote for the Sadler's Wells Ballet Company (now The Royal Ballet). His one original ballet (other than a student work, The Jew in the Bush (1928)), was Uncle Remus (1934), written for them. During the Second World War, Jacob wrote music for several propaganda films, and after the war he provided the score for the feature film Esther Waters (1948). A more personal take on the war is evident in the austere Symphony for Strings (1943), written for the Boyd Neel Orchestra. Jacob's Second Symphony, premiered on 1 May 1946 at a BBC studio recording, was considered by one reviewer to be "perhaps the most stimulating work that has yet come from this composer". The reviewer remarked on the work's intensity of feeling, ranging from romantic excitement in the first movement, through poignancy and fury in the two middle movements to a mood of heroism in the final passacaglia. Four new works appeared in 1951, the year of the Festival of Britain: Music for a Festival (for brass and military bands), concertos for flute and for horn, and the cantata A Goodly Heritage. Among the original compositions from Jacob's later years was incidental music to a dramatised adaptation of the biblical Book of Job, first performed at the Festival of the Arts, Saffron Walden, and later broadcast by the BBC. Arrangements Jacob's first major success was written during his student years: the William Byrd Suite for orchestra based on the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book. Boult conducted the first performance in February 1923. The Times called it "a brilliant piece of adaptation", and expressed the hope that it would be heard again. The music critic for The Times commented in 1932 that there was