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In just a couple of weeks, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir will fill the Conference Center at Temple Square for its nationally renowned Christmas concert known for its pageantry, storytelling and, of course, resplendent music. Over the course of three nights, more than 75,000 people will attend the free concert, which has become the hottest ticket in town.
Now, less than a month after its launch, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir’s official YouTube channel (youtube.com/MormonTabChoir) has reached a global audience of nearly four times that number and is on track to reach hundreds of thousands more.
Choir fans have collectively spent almost 600,000 minutes — more than one year’s time — watching performances, concerts and music videos on the channel. Viewers from 118 countries have subscribed to receive notifications from the Mormon Tabernacle Choir when new content is posted. Most of these subscribers are from the United States, Canada, Brazil, Germany, Mexico and the United Kingdom.
“YouTube has made the choir boundless,” said choir president Ron Jarrett. “Before the launch of our channel, there was no way to listen to Music and the Spoken Word if you couldn’t tune in live. Many of our fans couldn’t listen because of time zone differences or scheduling conflicts. Today our music is accessible for everybody, anywhere and at any time. High traffic from diverse places on the channel shows that this was a step long overdue.”
One unique asset of the choir’s YouTube channel is that it allows choir fans to interact with the choir through comments on its videos. So far, viewers have left comments in English, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, German and French.
One viewer’s comment sums up the consensus: “This is just what the world needs. When there is so much bad out there available to everyone, it’s comforting to see now that more and more good will be available to everyone!”
The official channel can be found at www.youtube.com/MormonTabChoir. It currently has almost 90 videos with 500 minutes of programing. New material is also available, including full episodes of the renowned program Music and the Spoken Word, past Christmas specials and concerts featuring special guests that are uploaded weekly.
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