Salt Lake City, Utah
When it comes to Christmas caroling, no one does it like the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. This magnificent choral society, one of the world’s finest, is amazingly prolific, with live performances and broadcasts on a nearly year-round basis. As a part of the Church of Latter Day Saints, they specialize in religious and inspirational music. Not surprisingly, they absolutely go to town for the holiday season, putting on what is probably the best Christmas concert in North America.
The Mormon Tabernacle Choir is one of the oldest institutions of the Mormon Church, and their most public face. Named for the Salt Lake Tabernacle, a meeting house in Salt Lake City where the choir practices and performs, the choir has been an active institution since their first performance in 1873. By the 1950s they had grown from a small, obscure singing group to an internationally acclaimed organization touring around the world.
The choir consists of 360 singers, drawn from some of the best talent in the Mormon Church, backed up by major orchestras as well as one of the world’s largest pipe organs. Their annual Christmas concerts usually feature a mix of carols, sacred music, and selections from Messiah. What makes their concerts particularly well loved is the respect with which the music is treated. They use only truly beautiful, classic arrangements that demonstrate a true respect and love of the season and Christian musical tradition.
The Mormon Tabernacle Choir gives several performances of their Christmas concert, usually in the two weeks leading up to Christmas day. Tickets are extremely difficult to come by. However, they do perform other concerts and sacred music throughout the year. Performance and ticketing information is available on their website. Web: www.mormontabernaclechoir.org (official website of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir).
Mike Martin says
I appreciated your posts regarding early Christian history in Xi’an, China, also the Tabernacle Choir in Salt Lake City ( I attended some years ago; magnificent)
Keep up the good work!
Howard Kramer says
Thank you sir!