Thought I would share with all of you the once-in-a-lifetime
experience I had singing with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir Sunday
morning, July 10.

I was in Salt Lake City, competing with my past international
champion New Tradition Chorus in the Barbershop Harmony Society's
international contest. The convention organizers set up a Sunday
morning broadcast of the weekly religious program, "Music & the
Spoken Word," followed by a special hour-long concert. In both
presentations, the MTC was joined by a 550-man chorus made up of past
Barbershop Harmony Society quartet & chorus champs, called the Gold
Medal Chorus.

The Conference Center, where the performances were held (since the
Tabernacle is closed until 2006 for large-scale renovation), is an
unbelievable hall, & singing with the MTC was an awe-inspiring
experience, never to be forgotten.

I've posted to the Photos section a picture that was taken our our
joint choruses during the performances. It's a .jpg file
titled "GoldMedalChorus-SaltLakeCityUT-071005."

To give you an idea of the size of our combined group, the top half
of the risers was occupied by the 360-voice MTC; the bottom half, by
our 550-man Gold Medal Chorus (see if you can find me: I'm the guy
wearing the blue blazer, white shirt, red tie, & tan slacks).

OK, granted that very little of the performance was truly a
cappella. The Gold Medal Chorus' rendition of "Deep River" was about
the only selection that was unaccompanied; MTC had the impressive
forces of an organ, drums, & bagpipes (!!!) to help them out.

The hour-long concert will be broadcast on the Hallmark Channel on
Sunday, Aug. 14 (6:30 a.m. Eastern & Pacific Times, 5:30 a.m. Central
Time, & 4:30 a.m. Mountain Time), if you wish to see & hear something
truly special. I also understand it's being played via streaming
video on www.byutv.org, but I'm not sure how you can call it up.

Oh, & if you'd like to see photos of New Tradition's contest set,
they're on the chorus' Web site at
www.newtradition.org/ntroster/Gallery -- despite turning in one of
our most inspired & flawless performances ever, we finished in third
place. All Barbershop Harmony Society contest performances are, of
course, strictly a cappella.

--Joseph Schlesinger
zinger99 @ juno . com (backup: schlesmail @ yahoo . com)
member North Wave Chorus (www.northwavechorus.com)
member New Tradition Chorus (www.newtradition.org)
founder Barbershop Harmony Chicagoland (www.bbs.singer.as)
847/328-0921