The Twelve

An Anthem for the Feast of Any Apostle

for SATB soli, mixed chorus, and organ (or orchestra)

General Information – Performing Forces – Manuscript – Publication – Recordings – Text

General Information:

Composition:
Completed by March 1965. Walton orchestrated the accompaniment later that year.

First Performance, Original Version:
16 May 1965. Choir of Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford. Sydney Watson conductor, Robert Bottone organ. Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford. Evensong service.

First Performance, Orchestral Version:
2 January 1966. Westminster Abbey, London.

Duration:
About 12 minutes

Text:
W. H. Auden (1907–73). Written in 1964.
Click here for complete text.

Tempi:
Maestoso – Allegro – Lento – Allegro  [304 m.]

Dedication:
"to Christ Church, Oxford and its Dean, Cuthbert Simpson"

Craggs Catalogue Number:
C77

Performing Forces:

Original Version:

Double mixed chorus (SATB/SATB)
        [The manuscript specifies the minimum choir size as 16 trebles, 4 altos, 4 tenors and 4 basses.]
Optional incidental solos for soprano, alto, tenor and bass

Organ

Orchestral Version:

Soprano, alto, tenor and bass soloists

Double mixed chorus (SATB/SATB)

2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons – 4 horns, 2 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba – timpani, percussion – harp – strings

Manuscript:

Bodleian Library, University of Oxford. Autograph score of the original version, with organ accompaniment.

Frederick R. Koch Collection. Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University. Manuscript FRKF 599. Autograph full score of orchestral version. 45 pages.

Publication:

Oxford University Press. Vocal score, 1966, 019 3386402 (discontinued).

Oxford University Press. Edited by Timothy Brown. William Walton Edition, Volume 6, "Shorter Choral Works without Orchestra", 1999, 019 3594323. Vocal score, 2000, 019 3594412.
            [Purchase online from SheetMusicPlus.com: Vocal score]
            [Purchase online from SheetMusicPlus.com: William Walton Edition, Volume 6]

Recordings:

Text:

            I

Without arms or charm of culture,
Persons of no importance
From an unimportant Province,
They did as the Spirit bid,
Went forth into a joyless world
Of swords and rhetoric
To bring it joy.

When they heard the Word, some demurred, some mocked, some were shocked: but many were stirred and the Word spread. Lives long dead were quickened to life; the sick were healed by the Truth revealed; released into peace from the gin of old sin, men forgot themselves in the glory of the story told by the Twelve.
Then the Dark Lord, adored by this world, perceived the threat of the Light to his might. From his throne he spoke to his own. The loud crowd, the sedate engines of State, were moved by his will to kill. It was done. One by one, they were caught, tortured, and slain.

            II

O Lord, my God,
Though I forsake thee
Forsake me not,
But guide me as I walk
Through the valley of mistrust,
And let the cry of my disbelieving absence
Come unto thee,
Thou who declared unto Moses:
"I shall be there."

            III

Children play about the ancestral graves, for the dead no longer walk.
Excellent still in their splendour are the antique statues: but can do neither good nor evil.
Beautiful still are the starry heavens: but our fate is not written there.
Holy still is speech, but there is no sacred tongue: the Truth may be told in all.
Twelve as the winds and the months are those who taught us these things: envisaging each in an oval glory, let us praise them all with a merry noise.

                        — W. H. Auden (1907–73)

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