Retired Mormon Tabernacle Choir director Jerold Ottley will be setting his baton in a new direction this week. Once again, Ottley will step up to the conductor's podium, but this time it will be to guest-conduct the Utah Chamber Artists' annual Christmas concert.
"I've been acquainted with (the Utah Chamber Artists) almost from their beginnings," Ottley told the Deseret News. "They're a fine group, a great representative of our community. (They're also) a very precise group, at least in their performance, and they sing with a very warm style, especially in Romantic literature.
"I think the permanent guest conductor is still Barlow Bradford, who organized the group. He does a couple of concerts with them a year, and he did one rehearsal with them before I met with them. I'm doing most of the rehearsing for this concert."
Ottley said that he also selected the program for the Christmas concert, adding "I had both hands and both feet and a partial mind involved, too."
The program will be presented on Tuesday, Dec. 5, and Wednesday, Dec. 6. Both performances begin at 7:30 p.m. in the Libby Gardner Concert Hall on the University of Utah campus. Tickets may be purchased by calling the Kingsbury Hall Box Office at 581-7100.
"The program is a rather wide variety," Ottley said. "We'll be doing some individual pieces that are short pieces, but we're doing two longer pieces. One of them is written by a former Utahn by the name of Daniel Gawthrop, entitled 'This Child, This King.' It's a very interesting work for organ, harp and timpani accompaniment.
"The other larger work we're doing is by a San Francisco composer by the name of Conrad Susa; it's called 'A Christmas Garland.' It's a collection of favorite Christmas carols done up in kind of new garb.
"Then we're doing some things by the composer Jackson Berkey, who is the keyboardist for Mannheim Steamroller. Anyone who knows their 'Fresh Aire' Christmas concerts knows that they do very interesting things, and he's done some most interesting arrangements of traditional carols, which we're going to do. The other things in the program are just a Noel or two and a 'Gloria in Excelsis'; some traditional kinds of things. It's a very eclectic program."
Actor Michael Jesse Bennet will also be on hand. "He's just introducing the program in various places throughout," said Ottley. "He will be acting more like a master of ceremonies."
Since his retirement from the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, Ottley has been keeping busy. "I'm still very much involved with the (Mormon Tabernacle Choir) as a volunteer staff member doing a lot of background work," he said. "My wife and I together are administering in teaching a new choral training school on Temple Square — that's for people who are attempting to get into the Tabernacle Choir. It's an arm of the Temple Square Chorale."
Ottley also mentioned that his approach to directing this choir will be different than his approach to directing the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.
"The Christmas concert of the Chamber Artists is always one of the highlights of the Christmas season in our city, and people ought to make an attempt to come if they can."
E-MAIL: rcline@desnews.com