Touring timeline of the Taber

BY GENELLE PUGMIRE Daily Herald

Over the last 150 years, there are few symbols of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as iconic as the Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square, formerly The Mormon Tabernacle Choir. From humble beginnings, the choir has undergone numerous changes, played for presidents and traveled the globe.

Below are some of the significant dates in the choir’s history, courtesy of Heidi Swinton, choir biographer:

Touring: 1800s

July 4, 1873: First public concert of Choir — outside of General Conference — in honor of Independence Day

Sept. 28, 1880: The Choir (about 150 singers) takes its first trip away from Salt Lake City, to American Fork.

Aug. 29–Sept. 12, 1893: The Choir’s first major tour is to the Chicago World’s Fair and Eisteddfod contest.

Touring:

1901 - 1920

March 14-24, 1902: Toured California cities giving concerts in San Francisco, Sacramento, Berkley and Palo Alto as part of the San Francisco World’s Fair.

Aug. 21–Sept. 1, 1909: Alaska-Yukon Pacific Exposition Tour including stops in LeGrand, Oregon and Seattle, Washington.

Oct. 23–Nov. 26, 1911: Embarked on a 5,500mile tour, performed 50 concerts between Utah and New York City. They also sang in the East Room of the White House for President William Howard Taft and at the dedication of the Oliver Cowdery monument, “Praise to the Man” while on tour.

Touring: 1921 -1940

July 15, 1929: First broadcast of what became “Music and the Spoken Word.” Director Anthony Lund (1871-1935), or- ganist Edward P. Kimball (1882-1937) and Ted Kimball (1910-1985) announced the program on KDYL, predecessor to today’s KSL radio.

Sept. 8-19, 1934: Chicago and the Century of Progress — 14 one-hour concerts. Henry Ford invited the choir to present a series of concerts for one week at the Century of Progress Exposition in Chicago.

July 18-28, 1935: Choir gave 14 concerts at the California-Pacific International Exposition at San Diego in the Ford Bowl, now called “Starlight Bowl, at the invitation of the Ford Motor Co.

Touring: 1941 to 1960

Aug. 17, 1941: Choir travels to southern

California for concerts at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles and the San Francisco Opera Association. The choir also sponsored a concert at the San Francisco Civic Auditorium.

April 4-6, 1943: The choir sang at the 50th Anniversary Celebration of the Dedication of the Salt Lake Temple. The music was the same as at the dedication.

Aug. 19–Sept. 17, 1955: The choir, with 361 voices, tours Europe starting in Glasgow, Scotland and traveling through Wales, England, The Netherlands, Denmark and Germany. Sang at Sporthalle Schoenberg for German saints who could cross the border and for the refugees from the Russian zone. The evening concert was shared in countries behind the

Iron Curtain by Radio Free Europe and broadcast over RIAS (Radio in the American Sector) to eastern Germany. While in Bern, Switzerland, they participated in the dedication of the Swiss Temple. The tour ended at the Palais De Chaillot in Paris, France. The choir gave fourteen concerts in twelve major cities. This was the first trip by the choir outside of the United States.

1958: Grand Eastern American Tour including Kansas, Missouri, Ohio, Washington D.C., Maryland, New York at Carnegie Hall, Constitution Hall in Philadelphia, Boston, Toronto and Illinois.

Nov. 26-29, 1959: A portion of the Choir were at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles when the Tabernacle Choir won a Grammy