"Leading dramatic soprano Deborah Voigt and acclaimed British actor and voice artist John Rhys-Davies join the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and Orchestra at Temple Square in a concert of holiday favorites.Among the highlights of the concert, conducted by Mack Wilberg and Ryan Murphy, are Voigt’s performances of the English carol 'The Holly and the Ivy' and the light-hearted 'The Twelve Days After Christmas' with the choir and orchestra. The program includes a new Mack Wilberg twist on the traditional song 'Christmas Is Coming (The Geese Are Getting Fat).' The Bells on Temple Square join the choir and orchestra for an upbeat rendition of 'Ring Those Christmas Bells.' The concert also includes Rhys-Davies’ dramatization of A Dickens Christmas with Robin Dick and the Christmas Players. The vignette features Rhys-Davies as the Ghost of Christmas Present soaring overhead at the LDS Conference Center in a dazzling scene of aerial choreography. Rhys-Davies also reads Luke 2: The Christmas Story with a fervor that moves audiences. Recognized as one of the world’s most versatile singers, Deborah Voigt is a leading dramatic soprano revered for her performances in the operas of Richard Wagner and Richard Strauss. She also has portrayed heroines of Italian opera to great acclaim. An active recitalist and performer of Broadway standards and popular songs, she appears regularly as both performer and host in the Metropolitan Opera’s Live in HD series. Acclaimed British actor and voice artist John Rhys-Davies is one of modern cinema’s most recognizable character actors, best known to film audiences for his role as Sallah in Raiders of the Lost Ark and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, and more recently as the ax-wielding dwarf Gimli in Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy. Together with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and Orchestra at Temple Square, Voigt and Rhys-Davies performed before a combined audience of 80,000 people in the annual concert taped in December of 2013 at the LDS Conference Center in Salt Lake City, Utah." [Source] Check your local listings for performance times this evening. You can also purchase the DVD and CD by clicking here.
"The Mormon Tabernacle Choir and Orchestra at Temple Square welcomed American soprano Deborah Voigt and British actor John Rhys-Davies for their annual Christmas concerts this past weekend in the Conference Center in Salt Lake City. The guest artists also joined the choir and orchestra for the weekly Music and the Spoken Word broadcast and a mini-concert on Sunday, 15 December. About 700 cast and crew are involved in the annual production, including dancers and the Bells on Temple Square. This is the first time Voigt and Rhys-Davies have made appearances with the choir. 'These are two such great additions for all that is happening on stage,' says Ronald B. Jarrett, president of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, who spoke during a news conference Friday at the Conference Center, which seats 21,000 people. 'It has been an absolute thrill to be here,' says Voigt, a leading dramatic soprano revered for her performances in the operas of Richard Wagner and Richard Strauss. The Chicago native raised in California has also portrayed heroines of Italian opera to great acclaim. 'I have been a fan of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir for a long time because I myself grew up in a church environment in the choir, where you will find a lot of opera singers have their first opportunity to sing,' explains Voigt. 'I have been blessed to sing in a lot of venues, but this was something really unique. The first time I walked in here and saw the vastness of this center, I couldn’t believe it. It feels much more intimate once it’s full of people.'" [Source]
More about the recording after the jump.
"Opera singer Nathan Gunn and actress Jane Seymour will be celebrating Christmas with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir this year. Gunn and Seymour were announced Thursday as guest stars of the choir’s annual Christmas Concerts, set for Dec. 15-18 in the LDS Conference Center in downtown Salt Lake City. Choir president Mac Christensen and music director Mack Wilberg made the announcement Thursday, as recent tradition dictates, on KSL radio’s The Doug Wright Show."Gunn, interviewed by Wright by phone from Houston, said he was thrilled to perform with 'the most famous choir on the planet.' It’s not Gunn’s first time with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. He performed in 1998 in the Salt Lake Tabernacle. 'It was shocking,' he said of the experience. 'I wasn’t prepared for the amazing warmth coming from behind me.'....The concerts are set for 8 p.m. on Dec. 15-17, and 9:30 a.m. on Dec. 18 (a live broadcast of "Music and the Spoken Word" with mini-concert to follow), in the 21,000-seat LDS Conference Center. The 84,000 tickets are free, and will be distributed by random drawing. Registration for the ticket drawing starts this Saturday at 12:01 a.m. and runs through Oct. 17. For more information, go to mormontabernaclechoir.org. [Source]
