Tabernacle Choir Sets Performances for Canada and Five U.S. States

The Tabernacle Choir will set a marathon pace this summer with a ten-day tour in Canada and the United States, followed by two other whirlwind trips.

First, the choir will perform in nine concerts and broadcast two of its weekly radio programs during a six-city tour June 22 through July 1.

The internationally known choral group is scheduled to perform in Toronto, capital of the province of Ontario, June 23 at Maple Leaf Gardens and June 24 at Roy Thomson Hall; the performances will be part of the city’s month-long International Festival commemorating its 150th birthday. The choir’s weekly “Music and the Spoken Word” broadcast will also originate from Thomson Hall on June 24.

June 25, the choir will perform for the first time in Ottawa, the capital of Canada. The performance will be in the National Arts Center.

The choir will sing in the Ford Auditorium at Detroit, Michigan, on June 26, then at the Auditorium Theatre in Chicago on June 27 and 28. On June 29, the 325-member group will perform two concerts in the Kansas City (Missouri) Music Hall.

The tour will conclude with three performances in Denver, including a concert June 30 in the Red Rocks Amphitheater. The choir’s weekly radio broadcast, followed by a miniconcert, will be held July 1 in the same location.

Jerold Ottley, Tabernacle Choir director, will be on the podium for the series of concerts. Robert Cundick and John Longhurst, Tabernacle organists, will provide organ and piano accompaniment. J. Spencer Kinard will provide commentary and the “Spoken Word” portions of the Sunday broadcasts, as he does each week.

The choir will resume its marathon pace July 25 when it flies to Los Angeles to spend a long day taping opening and closing numbers for a television special having to do with the Los Angeles Summer Olympics. The two-hour Olympic Gala is scheduled to be broadcast July 26, preceding the opening of the Summer Olympic Games. The show is being produced by Intercontinental Broadcasting Systems for airing by the ABC television network.

The choir will sing “The Star-Spangled Banner” to open the program, and “America, the Beautiful” to close it.

Choir members will fly to Los Angeles in the morning, take part in rehearsals through the afternoon, perform for the taping, then fly back to Salt Lake City that night after their work is finished.

On August 12, the choir will follow a similar schedule for another performance in Colorado. After its regular weekly radio broadcast, the group will fly immediately to Denver for a performance in Boettcher Concert Hall before 3,500 professional hospital administrators attending the convention of the American Hospital Supply Corporation.

The choir will return to Salt Lake City following the concert and a reception.