During the U.S. bicentennial celebration in 1976, Orson Welles lent his iconic voice to a stirring, Grammy Award-winning recitation of the Declaration of Independence.
His performance was initially released by Columbia Masterworks that year on its Great American Documents album (catalogue number USA-1776). The recording was remastered and re-released by Sony Classical to major streaming services, including Spotify, Amazon Music and Apple Music, in 2024.
Great American Documents featured dramatic readings by Welles, Henry Fonda, Helen Hayes and James Earl Jones with a performance of The Star Spangled Banner by the New York Philharmonic under the direction of Leonard Bernstein. In addition to the Declaration of Independence, Welles also read sections of the U.S. Constitution.
The Declaration of Independence was drafted in 1776 by a Second Continental Congress committee headed by Thomas Jefferson. It declared the 13 American colonies were severing ties to Great Britain. A bit of genealogical trivia, Welles was a distant relative – 11th cousin, four times removed – to committee member and future president, John Adams.
In February 1977, Great American Documents earned Welles the first of three Grammy Awards he would receive during his lifetime for Best Spoken Word Recording.
His youngest daughter, Beatrice Welles, sold the Great American Documents Grammy trophy in 2023 through Heritage Auctions for $8,125. She also sold her father’s 1979 Grammy for audio selections from Citizen Kane for $30,000 and the 1982 award for the vinyl release of his 1944 radio adaptation of Donovan’s Brain for $6,250. The buyers were not identified.
In addition to his three Grammy wins, Welles was nominated five other times, beginning with the satirical The Begatting of the President in 1971; followed by three vinyl releases of vintage radio programs in the 1970s and ’80s; and most recently for the This is Orson Welles audiobook with Peter Bogdanovich in 1993.
Audio of Welles’ reading of the Declaration of Independence is embedded below and can be found on YouTube, courtesy of Sony Classical.
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