Mormon Tabernacle Choir Milestones: Awards, Achievements, and More
The Mormon Tabernacle Choir was established more than 150 years ago and has since recorded extensively and toured in the United States and around the world. In that time, the Choir has had many noteworthy performances and achievements. Here are some of the more notable achievements:
Milestones and Achievements
The Choir has released more than 200 recordings.
While some of the older recordings are out of print, many of these albums are available on the shop page of our website.
Two of the Choir’s recordings have achieved platinum status (in 1991 and 1992).
A platinum album is acheived when there are one million copies sold.
Five of the Choir’s recordings have achieved gold status (two in 1963, one in 1980, and two in 1985).
Like platinum, a gold refers to sales. A gold album is earned for selling 500,000 copies.
The Choir has appeared at 13 World’s Fairs and Expositions.
The Choir has sung for 11 presidents of the United States, beginning with President William Howard Taft.
See a list of U.S. presidents the Choir has performed for.
The Choir performed over 20 times at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.
Watch the Choir perform "Call of the Champions," conducted by famous composer John Williams (Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Jaws, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial).
Awards
1959: The Choir’s recording of “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” won a Grammy Award at the second annual Grammy Awards.
The Choir also performed at the Grammy Awards ceremony.
1944, 1962: The Choir was awarded the Peabody Award.
1981: The Choir was awarded the Freedoms Foundation’s George Washington Award.
1987: The Choir won an Emmy Award for “Christmas Sampler,” a musical special.
2003: President George W. Bush awarded the Choir with the National Medal of Arts, which is “the highest award given to artists and arts patrons by the United States government.”
George W. Bush and his wife, Laura, stand with Choir staff at the White House.
2004: Library of Congress’s National Recording Registry (for the 1958 recording of Messiah).
2006: The Choir was awarded the Mother Teresa Award.
2014: The Choir won an Emmy Award for The Mormon Tabernacle Choir Presents an Evening with James Taylor.
2015: The Choir was inducted into the American Classical Music Hall of Fame.
Music & the Spoken Word
Music & the Spoken Word—the longest-running radio broadcast in the world—has been voted into the Radio Hall of Fame (2010), as well as the National Association of Broadcasters Hall of Fame (2004).