Capital city of Utah, USA. Since its founding in 1847 by members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, or Mormons, the city has enjoyed an unusually rich musical life, with a reputation for outstanding choral and orchestral music, as well as theatre and dance. It is home to a prosperous film and recording industry, and three area radio stations are devoted to classical programming. Although many of its cultural institutions were transplanted from abandoned Mormon communities in the Midwest, recent decades have brought increasing diversity to the region’s lively music scene. (See Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, music of the.)
The oldest and best-known of the city’s musical organizations, founded in 1847, is the Salt Lake Mormon Tabernacle Choir. Its weekly broadcast ‘Music and the Spoken Word’ from the tabernacle on Temple Square has brought the choir’s unique sound to an international audience since 1929. In addition to the choir’s many open rehearsals and performances, Temple Square offers daily recitals on the tabernacle’s famous Aeloian-Skinner organ and a popular concert series. In 1999 the Square’s musical resources were expanded to include the Temple Square Chorale and the Orchestra at Temple Square. The adjacent Conference Center, completed in 2000, seats 21,000 in the main auditorium; its flexible design provides a variety of theatrical and musical configurations.
A small professional orchestra was formed in the early 1860s in connection with the Salt Lake Theatre (1862–1928), which represented musical as well as dramatic fare. Handel’s Messiah, first performed there by the Handel and Haydn Society (later the Salt Lake Philharmonia Society) under London-trained George Careless in 1875, has been presented annually (except during the period 1942–4) by the Oratorio Society of Utah since 1915.
In 1892 the Salt Lake Theater Orchestra combined with musicians from the fire-ravaged Walker Opera House to form the first Utah SO, led by the Norwegian immigrant by Anton Pedersen. Successors to this orchestra performed at irregular intervals during the next half-century. In 1940 the Utah State SO was established by the Symphony Orchestra Association with Hans Heniot as conductor. Renamed the Utah SO, it attained fully professional status in 1946 under Werner Janssen, but achieved recognition largely through Maurice Abravanel, its music director from 1947 to 1979. Under his direction, recordings of works by Varèse, Milhaud, Gottschalk, Honegger and Satie, as well as one of the earliest recordings of the complete Mahler symphonies, won the Utah SO international acclaim. Abravanel was succeeded by Varujan Kojian (1979–83) and Joseph Silverstein (1983–98). In 1998 Keith Lockhart was named music director, with Pavel Kogan as principal guest conductor. The Utah SO performs in Maurice Abravanel Symphony Hall (opened in 1979 as Symphony Hall and named after Abravanel in 1992; see illustration). The Gina Bachauer International Piano Competition, formerly sponsored by the Utah SO but independent since 1986, has attained world-class recognition, with the major competition held every four years.
Opera, popular but sporadic in the 19th century, blossomed briefly in the 1920s in the Lucy Gates Grand Opera Company. Twenty years later, with imported principals such as the young Beverly Sills, opera and musical theatre reappeared in spectacular fashion in a celebrated summer festival held in the University of Utah’s athletic stadium from 1947 to 1960. Finally, in 1977, the Utah Opera, a permanent resident company, was formed by Glade Peterson, sharing performance space with Ballet West (established 1968) in the restored Capitol Theatre.
Chamber music, nourished initially by the city’s large European element, is fostered by the Salt Lake Chamber Music Society, the Abramyan String Quartet, Nova, Utah Chamber Artists, Canyonlands (avant garde) and the GAM Foundation (jazz). In recent years the Cathedral of the Madeleine’s annual arts festival, together with its unique Choir School, has attracted a large audience. Some 30 amateur orchestras, as well as jazz and concert bands, and countless popular and ethnic ensembles, can be found in the metro area. Summer festivals in nearby ski resorts attract professionals from across the USA.
The University of Utah was founded in 1850; its music department was established in 1888 and is administered by the College of Fine Arts. Vladimir Ussachevsky established the university’s electronic music studio in the 1960s and directed it until 1985. Completed in 2000, the university’s David P. Gardner Music Centre contains a 700-seat concert hall and Lively-Fulcher organ, and the scores and memorabilia of Maurice Abravanel. Marriott Library holds the papers of the composers Arthur Shepherd and Leroy Robertson, and the musicologist Hugo Leichtentritt. The department of music offers degrees in music education, history, theory, performance and composition, as well as liberal studies. The Professional Violin Making School of America offers certified training in the construction of musical instruments.
E.W. Tullidge: The History of Salt Lake City and its Founders (Salt Lake City, 1883–4), 774
G.D. Pyper: The Romance of an Old Playhouse (Salt Lake City, 1928)
W.J. Roylance: Utah: a Guide to the State (Salt Lake City, 1982), 201–68
C.B. Harrison: Five Thousand Concerts: a Commemorative History of the Utah Symphony (Salt Lake City, 1986)
M.S. Smith: With Them were Ten Thousand and More: the Authorized History of the Oratorio Society of Utah (Salt Lake City, 1989)
ROGER MILLER