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“Epoch in Musical History:” The Mormon Tabernacle Choir’s First Recordings
“Epoch in Musical History:” The Mormon Tabernacle Choir’s First Recordings
BY RICHARD E. TURLEY JR.
Today the Mormon Tabernacle Choir is among the most recognized performing groups on earth. Organized in the mid-nineteenth century in Utah, it has since become the centerpiece of the world’s longest-running continuous network radio broadcast (now also on television), Music and the Spoken Word, which is aired on more than two thousand radio and television stations and cable systems. The choir has released more than 160 recordings, which have sold millions of copies. Five of those recordings have achieved gold record status and two have gone platinum. Choir performances have led to a Grammy Award and an Emmy. And in 2010, the choir was named to the National Radio Hall of Fame—all with an unpaid group that is required to rehearse and perform on a demanding schedule.1
The Mormon Tabernacle Choir at the Chicago Worldʼs Fair in 1893.
UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED, ALL PHOTOGRAPHS IN THIS ARTICLE ARE FROM THE CHURCH HISTORY LIBRARY, THE CHURCH OF JESUS CHRIST OF LATTER-DAY SAINTS
The choir’s rise from obscurity to prominence was significantly bolstered by its long history of acclaimed sound recordings. That history began a century ago when the choir participated in its first-ever recording session, one that resulted in the earliest Tabernacle Choir records. Even the record company expected those experimental recording efforts to result in failure.2 But they were indeed successful both technically and musically, bringing state-of-the-art technology (though primitive by today’s standards) together with a choir that was just beginning to come into its own.
Situated at the crossroads of the West in Salt Lake City, the historic Tabernacle attracted many overland travelers, who sometimes commented on the quality of the fledgling choir and impressive organ they heard there. 3 But the choir received little formal acclaim until its trip to the Columbian Exposition in 1893 (also known as the Chicago World’s Fair) earned it a second-place finish in a choral competition.4
Even after that achievement, however, the choir remained relatively unknown, largely because few people around the world had heard it perform. With concert tours the choir began to be better known, but it was the popularization of recorded music that offered the greatest opportunity to expand the choir’s audience.5 Thomas Edison invented the phonograph in 1877, the year Brigham Young died. Over the next three decades, the functions of the phonograph and its related technologies came to be applied primarily to one use: the recording and playing of music. During that same time period, three major recording giants began to dominate the record industry: Columbia Phonograph Company, Victor Talking Machine Company, and Edison Phonograph Company. Each sought to capture the sounds of the world’s best available musicians for its growing lists of commercial records.6
These early days of sound recording offered many challenges. Although the microphone had been invented, it had not yet been developed to the point where it could record music well, and artists had to stand in front of a horn that focused sound toward an acoustic recording device. This technology, first developed for telephone use, generally worked well for solo artists or small ensembles but made it particularly difficult to capture the sounds of large performing groups.
In 1909, a fan of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir “noted the paucity of organ and church choir music in the [phonograph] machine catalogues.” He suggested that Joseph J. Daynes Jr., cofounder and manager of Daynes-Beebe Music Store, contact “the great eastern talking machine manufacturers” to encourage a recording of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and organ. The suggestion was well received, and a contact was made with Columbia Phonograph Company (and perhaps others). “They found the Columbia people entirely agreeable to the proposition” and firmed up the arrangements in a visit to New York some weeks later.7
Joseph J. Daynes Sr. Mormon Tabernacle organist.
Joseph J. Daynes Jr. had a long association with the choir—and with the local music scene. His father, Joseph Sr., had served as Tabernacle Choir organist for thirty-three years. His grandfather, John Daynes, had established a music store (John Daynes Music and Jewelry) in Salt Lake City shortly after his arrival in 1862. Joseph Jr. later worked as president and general manager of the Daynes Music Company, an offshoot of the original store that was owned by his father. In 1909, Joseph Jr. founded his own store, the Daynes-Beebe Music Company, with his brother-in-law Ovando C. Beebe.8
Columbia welcomed the overtures from Daynes. The New York company had been anxious to begin recording large groups and seemed eager to send specially developed equipment to Salt Lake City to capture the stirring sounds of the choir and organ. All the optimistic talk, however, was followed by the gloomy reality of delay.
On December 11, 1909, the Deseret Evening News reported, “Not a word has been heard from the Columbian Phono[g]raph people as to how long the delay will continue in sending to this city their special apparatus for recording performances of the Tabernacle choir and the organ, but Col. [Joseph J.] Daynes [Jr.], lo[o]ks for an expert and his machine next week.”9 But the sheer bulk of the massive machinery occasioned further delay— and spurred advancements in technology geared toward shrinking its size.
Two weeks later, on Christmas Day, the paper reported that New York’s “Columbia Talking Machine company” had notified Salt Lake City’s Daynes-Beebe Music Company that “the delay in sending the record-taking machine for recording the tabernacle choir and organ, has been caused by finding the regular apparatus too heavy and bulky, the weight being 500 pounds.” Columbia decided to invent a lighter machine and, “after repeated trials and experiments,” succeeded in creating one “weighing but 100 pounds.” Columbia explained that it was shipping the machine to Salt Lake City “in care of an expert who will conduct its operation.” The paper boldly announced, “Both the choir and Prof. [John J.] McClellan are ready to do their part when the apparatus comes.”10 McClellan was the chief organist for the Tabernacle and its choir. He served in that position for a quarter century, from 1900 to 1925.11
The Daynes-Beebe Music Store in 1914, located at 45 South Main Street in Salt Lake City.
Utah State Historical Society
If Utahns expected the machine’s quick arrival, they were once again disappointed. Many months would pass before it reached Salt Lake City. In August 1910, however, prospects finally brightened, and Tabernacle Choir conductor Evan Stephens intensified his efforts to hone his singers’ skills and solicit their participation in the anticipated recording session.12
At the time, the choir had a loose membership of around six hundred people, some of whom participated only on special occasions. In an August 20 Deseret Evening News article, Stephens commented on the recording session and encouraged a good turnout. Conscious of the potential long-term impact of the recordings on the choir’s reputation, Stephens said, “Inasmuch as the records, if acceptable, will be heard the world over, and represent our choir, the importance of a full representation of the singers will appeal to every one. Not less than 400 voices should be heard to do the choir justice in a phonograph.”
Four hundred singers was a lofty goal, one that could be achieved only by drawing on talented singers who had retired from active participation but had joined in past tours. The newspaper reporter said Stephens earnestly desired that “every prominent singer who has taken part in the choir’s work during the years past, especially those who have represented the choir on the excursions to California and Seattle in addition to all present regulars, be on hand next Thursday night, to drill carefully for the work in the selections to be recorded.” Stephens added the tantalizing detail that the recording would set a world record—the choir would be the largest ever recorded— hoping this claim to fame would entice more participants: It will be a matter of personal pride to every loyal member of the choir to have their voices included in this record—the first ever taken of a large choir. And a special list will be kept by the choir for future use, of the names of all taking part, that no one may in the future claim the honor who was not present. So members of the Harmony club, Seattle, California, Denver and world’s fair choruses, as well as the soloists who gave their services on those occasions, should be present to reinforce the regulars of today. Thus will be represented each and all groups who have for years past helped to maintain th[e] reputation of the choir.13
Joseph J. Daynes Jr., was instrumental in promoting and selling the first Tabernacle Choir recordings.
Besides encouraging participation from past choir members, Stephens had to deal with public interest in the event and whether people outside the choir could attend the recording session. “The public are inquiring if they can be admitted to this novel performance,” he explained. “The matter is being considered of admitting to the lower body of the house for a nominal price, all who may desire to be present.”14 At first, Stephens hoped to treat the recording session like a concert. It was a plan he would later abandon when the exacting requirements of the recording process made it clear that a live audience would generate unacceptable background noise.
His best estimate was that the first three evenings in September would be required to record all twelve of the numbers, which included the Mormon hymns “We Thank Thee O God, for a Prophet” and “O My Father,” as well as Handel’s classic, the Hallelujah chorus from the Messiah
Since the recording sessions would also focus on the Tabernacle’s famed pipe organ, organist John J. McClellan likewise selected his numbers with care, his goal being to “show adequately the remarkable orchestral and delicate, as well as the more powerful and majestic qualities,” of the instrument. Though his numbers were still under consideration at news time, the reporter observed, “He has decided to date, on the last movement from the overture to ‘Tannhauser,’ a movement from the A minor Fantasia of Mozart, as much of the D minor Fugu[e] of J.S. Bach as the record will admit, selections from ‘Cavaleria Rusticana,’ the Liebestodt [sic] from ‘Tristan and Isolde,’ the Gavot from ‘Mignon,’ ‘Annie Laurie’ with harmonic variations, the Batiste ‘First Communion,’ one of the most brilliant concert overtures, and others.” Reflecting the excitement building in the community, the reporter concluded, “There is a growing interest in this most novel experiment, and an ardent hope that every effort will be successful.”15
On August 22, the Deseret Evening News quoted Joseph J. Daynes Jr. as saying he had received intelligence from the Columbia Phonograph Company that “the machine to take the tabernacle records” was on its way and expected to reach Salt Lake City on the twenty-ninth, “with an expert from New York to conduct the experiments.” 16 Daynes, of course, was involved in the recording process from the conceptual stage, and he continued to be Columbia’s contact as record proofs were sent and then, later, as the actual records were delivered.
On Saturday, August 27, the News reported that Stephens had called a special choir rehearsal for Monday night, the day the recording machine was expected to arrive and be set up. The big question had become where to place the machine in the Tabernacle to get the best recording. The reporter wrote:
On Monday, as expected, the machinery arrived from New York in two shipments. The first reached Salt Lake City in the morning, and the parts were unloaded and “stacked up back of the Daynes-Beebe warerooms.” By noon, “Col. Daynes” was feeling optimistic about the venture. He had worried the machinery might arrive late, unduly shortening the recording time. The equipment’s timely arrival meant that both the choir and the organ could do “longer and better work.” The reporter who interviewed Daynes announced, “The expert and the remainder of the machine are expected this afternoon.”18
Later that day, the rest of the recording machinery arrived as expected, along with “the expert, A. Hausmann.” The Deseret Evening News called the five-hundred-pound machine with its “nearly 500 parts” a “rather complicated affair.” Some of the parts, the article noted, were “very delicate, requiring the most careful handling by an operator skilled and experienced in the work.”19
The gawkiest portions of the instrument were its “two great receiving horns,” each fifty-six inches in length and two feet wide at its opening. Their role was to capture the sound and direct it to the greatest technological wonder of all: “the recorder,” the component that transferred sound waves to wax. This device was “a little disc no larger than the palm of the hand” that was “made of the finest tempered steel, glass, wax, and a sapphire needle.” The choice of sapphire for the needle drew comment: “Diamonds were tried first in the place of sapphire,” the News noted, “but it was found that the latter jewel could not be improved upon, and now nothing else is used as a needle.”20
The source of these news details was the recording engineer, Alexander Hausmann, who warmed to the reporter and provided other interesting tidbits: “Mr. Hausmann says that while recorders are being steadily made, only about once a year is one turned out that does the work satisfactorily; and with this one, half a million dollars’ worth of discs can be made.”21
Evan Stephens, conductor of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, in his home on South State Street.
UTAH STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY
The recorder inscribed grooves in a wax blank revolving horizontally below it. The wax blanks came in bulk from Germany, and though their precise composition was a closely guarded secret, the reporter concluded quickly by observation that “most of the material is refined wax.” Hausmann explained the general process of manufacturing the blanks (as paraphrased by the reporter):
If a recording made on the wax proved unsatisfactory, the blank could be melted down and reused. The recording machine had to be kept clean, with “the most scrupulous care” being taken to guard “against dust or foreign matter of any kind getting into any of the working parts of the machine, as the slightest imperfection ruins the record.”23 Hausmann was the expert who would monitor the delicate process of recording on the wax blanks, something he had undoubtedly done many times before.
To assure the best recordings, Hausmann needed to raise the temperature of the recording wax to roughly ninety-five degrees Fahrenheit. During the Tabernacle recording sessions, the temperature in the old wooden structure would not reach the desired level. But Hausmann had come prepared. He would use an electric incandescent bulb to heat the wax to the ideal temperature.24
The greatest challenge for Hausmann was where to place the recording machine, a question on which local science aficionados had been opining for days. Using his best understanding of the Tabernacle’s shape and the physics of sound, Hausmann planned to choose a location for the device and make a test recording while McClellan played the organ. Hausmann hoped to place the instrument in a position that would capture with clarity both loud and soft passages from the organ. The News reporter wrote:
In Tuesday’s experiment, Hausmann planned to record “three or four bars of organ music” as McClellan played. Those bars would then be played back using “a special device prepared for that purpose.” Through trial and error, Hausmann hoped to find the right location to place the recording machine so that he could make successful wax recordings of the organ and the choir. He could then carefully pack the wax recordings for shipment to New York, where a matrix would be made of each from which the company could prepare “performing discs”—what later generations would simply call records.26
Even though Tuesday night’s session was closed to the general public, interest ran high “in these tabernacle experiments.” At first, the Deseret Evening News reported that by Thursday evening, September 1, the public was expected to witness “just how the thing is done . . . when the apparatus
will be in full working order.”27 Thursday was to be the first of three days of recording. After the Tuesday evening session, Stephens concluded it would be impractical to admit the public during the recording sessions because of “the necessity of absolutely no outside disturbing elements.”28
The experiments began a little after 6:00 p.m., when Hausmann, Daynes, McClellan, and George Studham—“an assistant”—arrived at the Tabernacle. McClellan took his seat at the organ, and Hausmann “placed the machine tentatively in the center of the house, then at the sides, then in the galleries, over at the east side of the auditorium, and next at the side of the organ.” Finally, he suggested putting the machine “on the ledge of the organ case under the ‘1896,’” the illuminated date of Utah’s admission to the union that proudly hung with a star above the organ case. To accommodate the recording machine, one of the front ornamental pipes of the organ was removed and the device positioned so that the wide opening of the long recording horn fit just inside the case.
Interior of the Salt Lake City Tabernacle in about 1896.
As planned, when the machine was ready, McClellan played “a few bars of music,” which Hausmann recorded and played back to him using a “reproducer.” Satisfied, McClellan “then played the final movement of the ‘Tannhauser’ overture.” The number recorded beautifully, and Hausmann declared “it could not have been bettered.” According to the Deseret Evening News, Hausmann also said the recording was the first ever made “from a pipe organ.”
Before Tuesday evening’s tests, no one was sure the experiment to record the organ and choir would succeed. But by the time the night ended, the Deseret Evening News was ready to declare the experiments “a complete success” that put to rest “all apprehension as to possible failure.”29
The next night, with the recording device in the same position, McClellan recorded other numbers. Columbia’s ten-inch disc technology made it possible to record just slightly over three minutes of music on a blank. “Wednesday night’s tabernacle organ performance for phonograph record was another gratifying success,” proclaimed the Deseret Evening News. “Prof. McClellan played the famous sextet from ‘Lucia,’ as much of the great D minor fugue of J. S. Bach as could be got into three minutes and 15 seconds, Nevin’s ‘Gondolier,’ a selection from ‘Cavaleria Rusticana,’ ‘Traumerie,’ ‘Evening Star,’ Mendelssohns’s ‘Spring Song,’ Rubinstein’s ‘Melodie in F,’ and the ‘Sixth Organ Toccata,’ by Widor, organist of St. Sulpice in Paris.” The article went on to explain that the organ’s sound capabilities outstripped the capacity of the recording machine to capture its range.
John J. McClellan, Mormon Tabernacle organist.
Between the Wednesday and Friday organ recording sessions, the choir performed to an empty house. Thursday’s Deseret Evening News explained: “The choir records are to be taken this evening at 7:30; but the public will not be admitted. Expert Hausmann of the phonograph company is very much pleased with the results so far, and does not anticipate any trouble at all in completing his work. The wax blanks containing the records go to New York where the matrices are to be made and the discs cast. The completed records will be ready for performance just before Christmas.”31 Thursday evening’s session was awaited with eagerness. Recording the organ was a challenge given its size and complexity. But recording a choral group the size of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir brought a different set of challenges. As noted earlier, Columbia had been transfixed with the notion of recording large performing groups, a goal that tested the limits of the new recording technology. The Thursday evening session, therefore, was set to make its own kind of history in the recording of choral music.
“What may, without stretch of the imagination, be considered the most interesting event in local musical history, occurred Thursday evening, in the tabernacle,” the Deseret Evening News exclaimed the next day. “It was the successful recording for phonographic reproduction, of 12 numbers sung by the tabernacle choir of 300 singers within two hours, by Expert Hausmann of the Columbia Phonograph company of New York city.”32
For readers unfamiliar with the technology race, the newspaper explained the significance of Thursday night’s success:
Although curiosity seekers and the press had pumped Hausmann for details about the recording process, he had apparently withheld a key bit of information about the trip itself, a secret that he now revealed since success was virtually assured. The News went on to report that, given the difficulty of the task, Columbia had “had no particular faith in the success of the Salt Lake experiments.” The company had sent Hausmann to Utah “rather . . . as a forlorn hope, expecting his experience would tally up with the experiences of the past.” In fact, another expert was to have traveled to Utah with Hausmann but abandoned the project because he “didn’t think it worth while.”34
The newspaper praised Hausmann, “this unpretentious, thoughtful German who has little to say, but a great deal to do.” Hausmann “took the matter in hand determined to make a success, if such a thing was possible.” Based on Thursday night’s recordings, Hausmann “made a success that if carried out, as expected, in the casting and disc making at the New York end, will have achieved what has been hoped for and dreamed of for the last four years or more.”35
The key to Hausmann’s success was how he arranged the physical setting so as to capture all the voices of the choir in balance. He and his assistant spent two hours experimenting with placement of the long horns that would direct the sound into the recorder. “Finally,” the News reported, “he suspended them from a rope stretched across from gallery to gallery, the flaring bells of the two horns covering [the singers]—the one the sopranos and altos, the other the tenors and basses, the small ends connecting directly with the machine where the choir leader stands at the east of the organ console.” The success of this arrangement could be determined only after the choir arrived, and “when the singers gathered,” the paper reported, “this was found to work satisfactorily.”36
The actual recording began at 8:00 p.m. At Hausmann’s request, “the ladies all removed their hats, and the entire aggregation of singers were packed in together as close as possible, all facing the horns.” Because of the distance of the recording equipment from the organ pipes, McClellan had to play the accompaniments fortissimo . Meanwhile, the soloists, soprano Lizzie Thomas Edward and baritone Horace Ensign, were asked to stand “with their faces in one of the horn bells.” “Of course,” the newspaper critic noted, “fine shading work was out of the question; massive effects were the principal thing.”37
Evan Stephens, the choir’s long-time conductor, had a reputation for directing the choir as though it were a single instrument.38 Certainly he knew that concert audiences might forgive and forget a stray note. But with recording technology, miscues could last indefinitely, stored in public and private music libraries. Before the recording began, Stephens addressed his singers in what was half warning, half pep talk. According to the Deseret Evening News, “Prof. Stephens again called to the attention of the choir that they were now about to sing for the world, to be careful not to let individual vo[ic]es stick out above the general ensemble, and to do their level best.” When Stephens’s brief speech ended, “Expert Hausmann turned his electric globe on the wax plate, and turned on the motor.”39 Choral history was about to be made.
The first order of business—just as it had been in recording the organ—was to record a few measures of music and play them back. The choir sang a few bars of the initial number to be recorded—“We Thank Thee, O God, for a Prophet”—and then paused as critics listened at the opening of the “reproducing horn.” As the first recorded sounds of the choir reached the ears of those positioned around the horn, they “expressed their delight, as the work was just what had been hoped for.” Success seemed “right within the grasp”; yet out of an abundance of caution, they tried the experiment again with “acceptable” results. It was now time for “full testing” to begin.40
The Deseret Evening News listed the following numbers, soloists, and times for the recordings made that evening:
“We thank thee, O God, for a prophet,” Mrs. Norton’s hymn; two stanzas, 2 minutes. Anthem, “Let the Mountains Shout for Joy!” by Prof. Evan Stephens; 3 minutes, 5 seconds.
“Soldier’s Chorus,” “Faust;” 2 minutes, 25 seconds.
“Hallelujah Chorus,” Handel, two plates; 2 minutes, and 1 minute, 50 seconds, respectively.
“Inflammatus,” Rossini, 3 minutes, 15 seconds; Mrs. Edward soloist.
“Gypsy Sweetheart,” Horace Ensign soloist; 2 minutes 43 seconds.
“Hosannah!” temple dedication anthem, by Prof. Evan Stephens; 3 minutes.
“Pilgrim’s Chorus,” “Il Lombardi;” 2 minutes 52 seconds.
“Light and Truth,” famous Welsh march; 2 minutes 7 seconds.
Lizzie Thomas Edward.
UTAH STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY
“America,” “Star Spangled Banner;” 2 minutes 53 seconds.
Hymn, “O My Father;” 3 minutes 40 seconds.
“Unfold Ye Portals,” from Gounod’s “Redemption;” 3 minutes 35 seconds41
The newspaper also described the spirit with which the choir members sang. “The choir was right on its mettle; it was ‘determined to do or die.’ It sang with a vim, a wholesouled vigor, an earnestness, a wonderful unison and attack that carried Prof. Stephens and those who were there to listen, almost off their feet, as the expression is.” To the reporter, Stephens in particular seemed “delighted, his face beamed like the rising sun, he was entirely satisfied that the work of that great choir could not have been bettered.” Those present who witnessed the performance compared it to the choir’s sterling performance “with Gilmore’s band” and “the wonderfully fine work done on that occasion.”42
After the choir had recorded its numbers, Hausmann was introduced to its members, expressing his cautious optimism. Record-making, he said, was intricate and included work yet to be done in the factory. He warned that “while the indications pointed toward success, still it would be well to wait and see how it came out in New York.” The choir members seemed to like the modest, competent engineer, and many shook hands with him afterward. “Manager Daynes of the Daynes-Beebe company was there to assist and represent the Columbia people, with the expert.”43
The final recording session in the Tabernacle took place on Friday, September 2, 1910. At 1:00 p.m. that day, according to the Salt Lake Herald, “Professor J. J. McClellan, at the organ, and Professor Willard E. Weihe, on the violin, rendered the ‘Cradle Song,’ by Sauret, and ‘Traumerei,’ by Schumann, immediately after which Professor J. J. Daynes, former organist at the Tabernacle, played the ‘Communion in G,’ by Batiste.” 44 By the Deseret Evening News account, “On Friday evening Willard Weihe played two violin solos. Prof. McClellan gave two additional organ numbers, and Prof. J. J. Daynes, former tabernacle organist, played two numbers on special invitation.”45
As on the other days, placement of the recording device was the major issue with which the musicians had to contend. When organ solos had been recorded on Tuesday and Wednesday evenings, the device had been set on the organ case with the flared part of its horn “reaching into the organ.” On this day, however, “the machine was placed on a level of the ‘Solo’ organ boxes, inside the case, so that the delicate stops of the two upper manuals could be used.”46 With the recorder inside the organ, Weihe had no choice but to climb inside the case so that he could play his violin near the horn flare.
Horace Ensign.
The News reported that with his recording work now finished, Hausmann was “entirely satisfied with the results of his experiments.”
In a final tally of the recordings, the Salt Lake Herald reported that “Hausmann took twenty-five records, twelve of which were selections by the famous Tabernacle choir, ten by Professor McClellan, two by McClellan and Professor Weihe, and one by Professor Daynes.” His work finished, Hausmann “left for the east . . . , enthusiastic over his success in getting a number of excellent records.”47
Once the recording sessions had all ended, Hausmann shipped the wax recordings by express to New York. The Deseret Evening News explained that a matrix would be made from each recording, “and the material from which the discs are made” would be “poured hot into the matrices, just like stereotyping.” Anticipation of the completed records ran high. “The discs are to be here by Christmas,” the News projected.48
To meet the Christmas deadline, preliminary discs had to be made in New York and shipped to Daynes-Beebe Music Company for approval sometime in October. On Friday evening, September 23, George W. Lyle, Columbia’s general manager, occasioned “a musical surprise party” in Salt Lake by sending an unexpected telegram to Joseph J. Daynes Jr., Daynes-Beebe’s manager. The telegram read, “First sample records completed; expressing you some today.”49
The Salt Lake Herald spread the word on Sunday with a headline echoing Paul Revere and trumpeting that the “Records Are Coming.” That same weekend the Deseret Evening News reported that although initially the record proofs “were not expected here for a couple of weeks yet,” Columbia had “pushed through” production of the samples at its Bridgeport, Connecticut, factory “with unusual expedition.” The paper quoted Daynes as saying he expected the proofs on “Monday next,” when there would “certainly be a great rush to hear them.” Although Columbia’s telegram said nothing about the quality of the records made from the wax discs recorded in the Tabernacle, “the fact that the records have been sent west, argues that they must be satisfactory,” the reporter concluded.50
Edward Elgar Acoustic Recording session, illustrating a “receiving horn.”
The proofs were expected on Monday, September 26, but the first copies did not actually arrive until Thursday. Meanwhile, Daynes-Beebe began clearing out its music store to prepare for expansion. An advertisement on Wednesday reminded readers that the company carried “the largest stock” of instruments and music “in this great intermountain country.” But its large building had “grown too small,” and, to make way for workmen, the company planned to liquidate sixty-eight pianos by 9:30 p.m. on Saturday.51 Finally, on Thursday morning, September 29, the first four proofs arrived: two organ numbers (“Pilgrim’s Song of Hope” and the final movement in the overture to “Tannhauser”) and two choir numbers (“O My Father” and “Let the Mountains Shout for Joy”). Joseph J. Daynes Jr. played them on a phonograph in his company’s “warerooms,” as John J. McClellan, Horace Ensign, and “a number of local musical enthusiasts” listened in. Their first attempt at listening to one of the samples was on a Grafanola, a newly developed machine that combined “a writing table with a talking machine.” But “the volume of sound was too subdued,” so they switched to a more traditional horn machine. Their verdict: “They are a success.” As the Deseret Evening News reported:
The reviewer went on to note that the heavy bass tones on the organ had been lost, but such limitations in recording were “characteristic of ordinary band reproductions.” Despite any flaws in the product, McClellan was thrilled. He observed that “this is the first time in the history of phonograph record taking where a large body of singers was able to sing with satisfactory results. The record of the Papal choir in the Sistine chapel was a failure in comparison.”53
Other reviewers were equally enthusiastic. The reviewer for the Salt Lake Herald commented on the “marvelous fidelity of expression, the tunefulness of the Tabernacle choir, and the greatness of the tabernacle organ.” He thought that the rendition of “O My Father” in particular would become a popular record. “Filled with all its varying emotions, sonorous at times and swelling from the subtle into the full depth of proclaimed affection, the favorite hymn is repeated with all its intensity of feeling in the phonograph record. . . . The splendid harmony and blending of the choir voices is remarkably brought out and faithfully reproduced.” He further predicted—with exuberance—that the recordings would bring the choir “world-wide attention.”54
Fifteen additional proofs arrived from New York on October 11. Six recordings had been substandard, and no proofs were sent of those songs. With each of the failed recordings, “the records were uneven, good in places, but blurred or too faint in others.” Included among the rejected songs were “Inflammatus,” “We Thank Thee, O God, for a Prophet,” and at least two organ numbers. Of the record proofs that were produced, one presented the violin and organ duet, six held choir numbers, and the remaining dozen had organ performances.55
When Daynes tested the new proofs, he found that all were at least “satisfactory,” and some were “remarkably excellent. The ‘Hosannah’ anthem and the ‘Hallelujah’ chorus from the choir were not merely impressive, they were majestic. A great volume of song rolled forth from the machine that certainly did the choir justice. . . . The ‘Hallelujah’ number is in two records, which may make it rather awkward, although the quality is unimpeachable.” The writer then noted a peculiarity in the recording of the “Hallelujah” chorus: “As the first part ends, one of the sopranos had failed to notice Conductor Stephens’ baton fall, and kept on.” He added straightforwardly: “Her continuation of the strain is faithfully reproduced.” (It was that moment in the recording that later generated “considerable merriment” when the song was played for the choir—to the almost certain embarrassment of the offending singer.)56
The News was equally complimentary about the other recordings: Willard Weihe’s violin solo “could hardly have been bettered,” a particularly remarkable feat given the fact that it was recorded “with the violinist perched up inside the instrument, with no communication whatever with the organist.” “My Little Gypsy Sweetheart,” by soloist Horace Ensign and the choir, was viewed as “the gem of the entire repertoire.” Ensign’s voice had “a richness of tone that would do credit to the baritones of the Metropolitan opera company.” The organ numbers were “marvelous,” “remarkable,” “dramatic,” and “gratifying.”57
Throughout all the songs, the Salt Lake Herald recorded, concurring with the Deseret Evening News, “the original expression has been preserved, and the more subtle tonal values, so frequently lost in recording the human voice, faithfully reproduced.” Still, the recording technology left something to be desired: capturing the “heavy pedal notes” was “an acoustic impossibility.” In the future, “separate receiving trumpet arrangements” would be needed to “record the heavy pipes of the pedal organ.”58
One of the first records of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir produced by Columbia Records, entitled Mormon Hymn— “O My Father.”
After the private reviews of the record proofs, listening opportunities were staged for the public. On September 29, the Tabernacle Choir heard the first four records.59 The day after the additional record proofs arrived on October 11, “half an hundred people heard the concert of . . . most of the nineteen records” at the DaynesBeebe Music Company. 60 Another such opportunity was made available the next day. And at the choir rehearsal that same evening, the choir heard all the recordings that had been received, “a large attendance being present.”61 No mention is made of whether families of choir members or anyone from the general public attended. First the “talking machine” was placed “on the President’s stand in front of the choir.” The result was less than satisfactory, and the operators moved the machine to the rail of the rear gallery, which acoustically worked much better, “the volume of sound filling the great tabernacle auditorium to a degree that was surprising.”62
Even though the reviewer on this occasion was very complimentary (it was apparent that no one in the choir “did any soldiering,” he said, referring to the practice of pretending to work while actually loafing), he did observe that the songs seemed rushed. Because of the limitations of recording very short records, “the tempo has to be quickened considerably beyond that in which it was taken by the choir, so to that extent they could hardly be called correct.” But the recording company was planning to use fourteen-inch plates the next time, which would “extend the duration of performance one minute, at least.”63
Overall, the “concert” was deemed so successful that Stephens proposed that they give a public recital of the records. But such a recital was never subsequently mentioned in the local newspapers—which had thorough coverage of the choir and its recordings— suggesting that it never occurred. Perhaps the sale of the actual records obviated the need for another public concert.
The first twenty-five copies of the finished records (as opposed to record proofs) arrived in Salt Lake City on October 29, and a thousand more were announced as being on the way. The first batch of mass-produced recordings included “O My Father”; “Let the Mountains Shout for Joy”; “Little Gypsy Sweetheart”; and “Cradle Song,” the violin number played by Willard Weihe.64
The Mormon Tabernacle Choir shortly after Utah Statehood in 1896.
Of the twenty-five recordings that were made, the sound quality on nineteen was regarded as good enough for proofs; of those, only eight were judged to be of sufficiently high quality for commercial release. The first shipment sold out the first day. A Daynes-Beebe advertisement boasted: “Never in the history of the famous Tabernacle Choir has there been anything transpire that has more favorably brought the magnificent work of the organization before the public” than the release of the Columbia records. It was “incredible” but true that individuals could “have the songs of this great body reproduced” in their own homes. Listeners would “hear the thundering tones of this great organ peal out its melodious tones”—and then “hear the choir sing the songs that fairly set you wild with enthusiasm.” The Tabernacle Choir, the ad writer said, was an “instantly 64 responsive singing organization—the greatest choral association in the world.” The cost of owning these records? “The marvelously low price of 75¢.” And if the readers didn’t own a phonograph machine, Daynes-Beebe would sell them one “on very easy monthly payments.”65
After the records were produced, advertised, and available for purchase, Columbia finally signed a recording contract with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The contract specified that American Graphophone Company, the parent company of Columbia Phonograph Company, had “the sole and exclusive right to make talking machine sound records of the Tabernacle organ and choir . . . for the term of three years from date hereof.” The church was to be paid a royalty of 7 percent of all the records manufactured—although 25 percent of such records were exempted from the royalty because of possible “over-manufacture as compared with sales,” returns on records sold, and “the wearing out of records in demonstrations, etc.” The contract was signed on November 15, 1910, by Joseph F. Smith, President of the Church and “Trustee-in-trust for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints” and (apparently) George W. Lyle, vice president and general manager of American Graphophone Company.66
Even though the choir recordings elicited true excitement in Salt Lake City, the records do not seem to have been distributed nationally or marketed widely by Columbia. None of the Columbia catalogs of the era appear to mention the recordings, perhaps because the recent Reed Smoot hearings (1904-1907) had left many Americans with a distaste for Mormons.67 In fact, even though Columbia had gone to significant expense to make the recordings, they may have left it to Daynes-Beebe to be the sole distributorsfor the Tabernacle Choir records.68 Still, it was an auspicious beginning to the choir’s gradual transformation from a regional choir to a worldwide recording giant. In the first fifty years after those humble beginnings, the choir released fourteen additional record albums. In the subsequent fifty years, it has released more than 160, becoming one of the most prolific recording groups in history.
NOTES
Richard E. Turley Jr. is Assistant Church Historian and Recorder for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints. Prior to this appointment, he served for eight years as managing director of the combined Family and Church History Department, four years as managing director of the Family History Department, and fourteen years as managing director of the Church Historical Department. He is a coauthor, along with Ronald W. Walker and Glen M. Leonard, of Massacre at Mountain Meadows (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008). The author wishes to thank Grant A. Anderson, Alison K. Gainer, Jay A. Parry, and Rebecca M. Taylor for their assistance on this article.
1 “Frequently Asked Questions,” http://mormontabernaclechoir.org. This official website of the choir states, “The Choir has released more than 130 musical compilations.” However, an actual count of the records listed yields a total of 168 releases by the choir (including new compilations from previously released albums and remastered albums). The 1959 Grammy for the best performance by a vocal group or chorus was awarded to Richard P. Condie, the choir director, for “The Battle Hymn of the Republic,” performed by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. See http://www2.grammy.com/Recording_Academy/ Awards/ (accessed November 17, 2010).
2 “Big Choir Sings into Phonograph,” Deseret Evening News, September 2, 1910.
3 Ronald W. Walker, “The Salt Lake Tabernacle in the Nineteenth Century: A Glimpse of Early Mormonism,” Journal of Mormon History 32 (Fall 2005): 229–32.
4 Utah at the World’s Columbian Exposition (Salt Lake City: Salt Lake Lithographing Co., 1894), 59. See also Reid L. Neilson, Exhibiting Mormonism: Latter-day Saints and the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair (New York: Oxford University Press, forthcoming).
5 For a discussion of the choir’s early out-of-state tours, see J. Spencer Cornwall, A Century of Singing: The Salt Lake Mormon Tabernacle Choir (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1958), 64–69, 75–81.
6 Tim Brooks, The Columbia Master Book Discography, Volume 1: U.S. Matrix Series 1 through 4999, 1901–1910 with a History of the Columbia Phonograph Company to 1934 (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1999), 1–3; Gary Marmorstein, The Label: The Story of Columbia Records (New York: Thunder’s Mouth Press, 2007), 7–8, 11–12, 15–16, 19; Andre J. Millard, America on Record: A History of Recorded Sound, 2nd ed. (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 50; “Scenes in Columbia Record-Making Laboratory,” The Music Trades, August 27, 1910.
7 “Music and Musicians,” Deseret Evening News, October 30, 1909.
8 Andrew Jenson, Latter-day Saint Biographical Encyclopedia, vol. 1 (Salt Lake City: Deseret News, 1901), 746; Utah: A Centennial History, vol. 3 (New York: Lewis Historical Publishing Company, 1949), 56–57; Ralph B. Simmons, comp. and ed., Utah’s Distinguished Personalities, Commonwealth Edition, vol. 1 (Salt Lake City: Personality Publishing, 1933), 86. The wives of Joseph J. Daynes Jr. and Ovando C. Beebe— Winnifred B. Woodruff and Clara M. Woodruff, respectively—were both daughters of Wilford Woodruff and Emma Smith Woodruff. Men of Affairs in the State of Utah (Salt Lake City: The Press Club of Salt Lake, 1914), n.p.; Matthias F. Cowley, Wilford Woodruff: History of His Life and Labors (Salt Lake City: Deseret News, 1909), 691.
9 “Music and Musicians,” Deseret Evening News, December 11, 1909. Joseph J. Daynes Jr. was called “Colonel” because he “was lieutenant-colonel of the staff of Gov. John C. Cutler for four years, and was re-appointed to that position by Governor William Spry, serving four years.” Men of Affairs in the State of Utah (Salt Lake City: The Press Club of Salt Lake, 1914), n.p.
10 “Music and Musicians,” Deseret Evening News, December 25, 1909.
11 Latham True, “John J. McClellan,” The American Organist 2 (April 1919): 144–46; Roger L. Miller, “Mormon Tabernacle Choir,” Utah History Encyclopedia, ed. Allan Kent Powell (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1994), 379.
12 Evan Stephens was the director of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir for twenty-six years, from 1890 to 1916. J. Spencer Cornwall, A Century of Singing: The Salt Lake Mormon Tabernacle Choir (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1958), 11. Today, eighteen of Stephens’s hymns appear in the 1985 edition of Hymns of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
13 “Records to be Made,” Deseret Evening News, August 20, 1910. The claim that this recording was to be “the first ever taken of a large choir” is corroborated by articles in the national music press. The Music Trade Review (September 17, 1910) wrote, “After many trials to make acceptable records of large bodies of singers, the Columbia Phonograph Co., General, New York, have been successful. In the celebrated Mormon Tabernacle of [Salt Lake] city, on the evening of September 1, the reproductions of twelve numbers, sung by the Tabernacle choir of 300, were secured within two hours by Expert Hausmann, of the Columbia recording laboratory.” In an article published on the same day, The Musical Age reported in the same vein, noting that fortunes had been spent on the effort to develop the technology to record large choirs, “but to no purpose.” Searches of major online catalogs (the Library of Congress Catalog and the British Library Sound Archive Catalogue) also do not yield any evidence of a recording by a large choir before 1910—with one exception. An experimental recording of a four-thousand-voice chorus was made at the Crystal Palace in London in 1888. The chorus sang Handel’s Moses and the Children of Israel; Colonel George Gouraud, who made the recording, did so from “a distance of 100 yards.” The catalog claims that this is the “earliest known recorded music in existence.” See http://cadensa.bl.uk/uhtbin/cgisirsi/B86bjU9ijs/WORKS-FILE/0/49 (accessed November 17, 2010).
14 “Records to be Made,” Deseret Evening News, August 20, 1910.
15 Ibid.
16 “Machine on the Way,” Deseret Evening News, August 22, 1910.
17 “Music and Musicians,” Deseret Evening News, August 27, 1910.
18 “Recording Machine Here,” Deseret Evening News, August 29, 1910.
19 “Ready to Record Tabernacle Choir,” Deseret Evening News, August 30, 1910. On December 25, 1909 the Deseret News in “Music and Musicians” reported that Columbia was sending a one hundred pound machine, but it appears they reverted to the larger machine
20 Ibid. The reporter considered the recorder to be almost priceless. The rest of the machine he valued at $450.00.
21 Ibid. After the recording sessions in Salt Lake City, the newspaper elaborated on the wondrous sapphire needle: According to the phonographic expert who was here last week, the entire success of a record taking depends on so apparently simple a thing as a sapphire needle which transmits the sound waves from the receiving trumpets to the recording wax blank. This needle must be tapered “just so,” the diameter of the needle must be “just so,” to the thousandth of an inch. It has been found possible with the mechanical appliances at hand to reproduce just such dimensions only about once a year, though needles and recording discs are being constantly made. The glass must be of just such a thickness, the metallic parts exactly in sympathy, in fact it seems to be about as difficult to make one of these things as a large telescopic lens. “Music and Musicians,” Deseret Evening News, September 10, 1910.
22 “Ready to Record Tabernacle Choir,” Deseret Evening News, August 30, 1910.
23 Ibid.
24 “Music and Musicians,” Deseret Evening News, September 10, 1910.
25 “Ready to Record Tabernacle Choir,” Deseret Evening News, August 30, 1910.
26 Ibid.
27 Ibid.
28 “Cannot Admit Public,” Deseret Evening News, August 31, 1910.
29 Ibid.
30 “Record Organ Successfully,” Deseret Evening News, September 1, 1910. References in this paper to Daynes as organist or to “Professor Daynes” refer to the elder Joseph Daynes.
31 Ibid.
32 “Big Choir Sings into Phonograph,” Deseret Evening News, September 2, 1910. 33 Ibid.
34 Ibid.
35 Ibid.
36 Ibid., and “Music and Musicians,” Deseret Evening News, September 3, 1910.
37 “Big Choir Sings into Phonograph,” Deseret Evening News, September 2, 1910.
38 George D. Pyper, “Six Thousand Miles With the ‘Mormon’ Tabernacle Choir: Impressions of the Manager,” Juvenile Instructor 47 (March-December 1912): 201, 321.
39 “Big Choir Sings into Phonograph,” Deseret Evening News, September 2, 1910.
40 Ibid.
41 Ibid. The correct title of Verdi’s opera is I Lombardi, or, in full, I Lombardi alla prima crociata The Opera Quarterly 20 (Winter 2004): 26.
42 Ibid. Gilmore’s Band was a brass band founded by Patrick Sarsfield Gilmore, who is regarded as the “Father of the American Band.” Gilmore also wrote the lyrics to “When Johnny Comes Marching Home” and the music to the famous “22nd Regiment March.” See http://www.psgilmoresociety.org/aboutGilmore.html (accessed November 17, 2010). Gilmore appears to have first visited Salt Lake City in April 1876, when he performed with his band in the Tabernacle. It does not appear that the choir also performed on that occasion. http://www.worldmilitarybands.com/the-bent-brothers/ (accessed November 17, 2010). In 1889 Gilmore returned to Salt Lake City to direct “Gilmore’s Grand Musical Festival,” which was presented three times in the Tabernacle. Participating in the festival was a four-hundred-voice choir organized by Evan Stephens. Even though Stephens’s choir, which he called the Salt Lake Choral Society, was not exclusively composed of Mormons, it did include many members of the Tabernacle Choir. Charles Jeffrey Calman, The Mormon Tabernacle Choir (New York: Harper & Row, 1979), 55. It may be this latter visit that is being referred to in the Deseret Evening News article.
43 “Big Choir Sings into Phonograph,” Deseret Evening News, September 2, 1910.
44 “Last Records Secured,” Salt Lake Herald, September 3, 1910.
45 “Music and Musicians,” Deseret Evening News, September 3, 1910.
46 Ibid.
47 “Music and Musicians,” Deseret Evening News, September 3, 1910; “Last Records Secured,” Salt Lake Herald, September 3, 1910. The word records here refers to recordings, rather than the finished product, as we presently use the word.
48 Ibid. Stereotyping was a process borrowed from printing, in which a mold, or matrix, was created from a one-of-a-kind original, from which matrix many copies could be made. In the case of printing, the original was the metal type arranged for a set of pages; in the case of recording, it was the wax on which the recorded impressions were made. See Edward H. Knight, American Mechanical Dictionary , 3 vols. (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin and Co., 1876), 3:2379–82; Lovell N. Reddie, “The Gramophone, and the Mechanical Recording and Reproduction of Musical Sounds,” Journal of the Royal Society of Arts 56 (May 8, 1908): 633–48.
49 “Choir Records Coming,” Deseret Evening News, September 24, 1910.
50 “Tabernacle Choir: Records Are Coming,” Salt Lake Herald, September 25, 1910; “Choir Records Coming,” Deseret Evening News, September 24, 1910.
51 “68 Pianos Must Be Sold During Next Three Days,” Deseret Evening News, September 28, 1910. Sale prices on the pianos ranged from $127 to $296, all for upright models—generally they were selling for about half price. By the time of this ad, 131 pianos had been sold in eight days.
52 “Choir Records Prove Success,” Deseret Evening News, September 29, 1910.
53 Ibid.
54 “Records True in Expression,” Salt Lake Herald, September 30, 1910.
55 “Choir and Organ Records Splendid,” Deseret Evening News, October 11, 1910. Besides the choir numbers mentioned, this article noted two organ numbers that didn’t make the cut: “Mignon” and “Andantino.” Another newspaper report gives a somewhat different list of songs in which the recording failed: “Inflammatus,” “Unfold Ye Portals,” “Soldier’s Chorus”—all by the choir—and three organ numbers: “Traumerei,” “Mignon,” and “patriotic airs.” No mention is made in that report of “We Thank Thee, O God, for a Prophet.” “Music and Musicians,” Deseret Evening News, October 15, 1910; “Records by Choir Highly Pleasing,” Salt Lake Herald, October 13, 1910.
56 “Choir and Organ Records Splendid,” Deseret Evening News , October 11, 1910; “Music and Musicians,” Deseret Evening News, October 15, 1910.
57 “Choir and Organ Records Splendid,” Deseret Evening News, October 11, 1910.
58 “Records by Choir Highly Pleasing,” Salt Lake Herald, October 13, 1910; “Choir and Organ Records Splendid,” Deseret Evening News, October 11, 1910.
59 “Choir Records Prove Success,” Deseret Evening News, September 29, 1910.
60 “Records by Choir Highly Pleasing,” Salt Lake Herald, October 13, 1910.
61 “Choir Hears Records,” Salt Lake Herald, October 14, 1910.
62 “Music and Musicians,” Deseret Evening News, October 15, 1910.
63 Ibid.
64 “Music and Musicians,” Deseret Evening News, October 29, 1910.
65 “Tabernacle Choir Records Prove a Tremendous Hit!” Deseret Evening News, November 14, 1910.
66 Contract between American Graphophone Company and Joseph F. Smith, Trustee in Trust for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Joseph F. Smith presidential era papers, Church History Library.
67 See Kathleen Flake, The Politics of American Religious Identity: The Seating of Senator Reed Smoot, Mormon Apostle (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2004).
68 “Tabernacle Choir Records Prove a Tremendous Hit!” Deseret Evening News, November 14, 1910.
