Tabernacle Choir performs at Georgia State Capitol at 9/11 ceremony
Sep 11, 2024, 12:06 PM | Updated: 10:07 pm
ATLANTA — The Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square performed at the Georgia State Capitol at a ceremony commemorating 9/11.
The Utah-based choir is in Georgia as part of its “Hope” tour of the southeastern United States. Their visit Wednesday morning to the Capitol came at the invitation of Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp.
The choir was part of a brief ceremony marking the anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks. Led by music director Mack Wilberg, they sang three songs – The Star-Spangled Banner, America the Beautiful, and God Bless America.
Their performance – which rang powerfully and majestically through the Capitol – brought the audience to their feet and left some people wiping their eyes.
“It was stunning,” said L. Whitney Clayton, a member of the Tabernacle Choir presidency, following the performance.
Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp said the Tabernacle Choir is made up of “heavenly, incredible voices.” during a ceremony commemorating 9/11 at the Georgia State Capitol on Wednesday, Sept. 11, 2024. (Greg Anderson, KSL TV)
Paying tribute
In his remarks, Kemp said the choir was made up of “heavenly, incredible voices.” Kemp paid tribute to the victims of 9/11 as well as those who were killed and injured last week in a school shooting in Winder, Georgia, which is about an hour away from Atlanta.
“Just as we did in the days following the September 11th attacks, we are all coming together to pray for the families and friends and those touched by this tragedy,” Kemp said. “We are gathering around them and their community to lift them up as they endure in this painful time.”
The Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square was honored earlier this year by the Georgia State Senate for its long history of broadcasting Music and the Spoken Word, and for its collaboration with glee clubs at Morehouse College and Spelman College in Atlanta.
Those groups performed together Monday, and they put on a final concert Wednesday evening at State Farm Arena in Atlanta. The Tabernacle Choir heads back to Salt Lake City on Thursday.
“We’re taking the message of hope in Jesus Christ across the world,” Clayton told KSL TV. “Hope can be found if we know where to look for it, and we believe the choir’s message of hope in Jesus Christ does that.”
