Looking back at 5,000 episodes of ‘Music and the Spoken Word’

EDITOR’S NOTE:  To listen to this segment live, visit KSL NewsRadio’s live listening page. Otherwise, a podcast version of this segment will be available on this webpage after it airs

SALT LAKE CITY — “Music and the Spoken Word” began broadcasting on July 15, 1929 and has since become the world’s longest continuing network broadcast.

It began when a local radio crew ran a wire from their control room to an amplifier in the Salt Lake Tabernacle, an acoustically renowned gathering space for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The radio crew placed the station’s only microphone on a ladder to capture the music, and to allow an announcer to introduce each number.

“Music and the Spoken Word” is now broadcast on over 2,000 radio and television stations around the world, reaching an audience of over 6 million people.

Since 1929, four people have leant their voices to the spoken word element of the program, beginning with Elder Richard L. Evans, an Apostle for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He was followed by Spence Kinard, Lloyd Newell, and now Derrick Porter.

“I had watched the program with some regularity prior to this calling that I now hold. I had brought guests here to witness and experience it, and always walked away with feelings…of hope and peace,” Porter said.

“But now, being here, which I might add has been for 1% of the 5,000 broadcasts. I’ve only experienced 1% of this the magnificence of “Music and the Spoken Word.” But I actually feel that I view the world differently.”

Episode 5,000 of “Music and the Spoken Word,” a huge milestone, aired on July 13, 2025.

“This is a big moment. Five thousand. Five thousand consecutive weeks. That’s a big number. And I think just in its proportion it can be celebrated,” Tabernacle Choir Director Mike Leavitt said.

“However, when we get into the significance of this, how over literally decades, decade after decade, through whatever the condition of the world, there was this sense of constant value that’s been provided in a very unique recipe.”

Leavitt said that recipe combines music with words of comfort and inspiration, put together with 360 choir members to create a sense of hope, joy and peace for listeners. 

Building the 5,000th episode of ‘Music and the Spoken Word’

The episode, “Five Thousand Weeks of Inspiration,” focused on the program’s mission to inspire feelings of peace, hope and a deeper connection to the divine.

The message was shaped by more than 1,200 stories submitted by viewers and listeners from all over the world.

Those stories include one about six-year-old Caden Simpson. He was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer, and spent 9 months away from home while undergoing 6 rounds of intensive chemotherapy and a liver transplant.

Porter says Caden’s, and all the other stories, boiled down to the same message. “‘Music and the Spoken Word’ stirred something deep within me, a feeling that gave me the strength to continue forward.”

Richard Elliot is one of several organists that performs with the choir during the program, and has been doing that for the last 34 years.

It’s been a great blessing for me. Of course there’s pressure and you want to do your best and it’s a lot of effort, but at the same time it also feeds my soul, Elliot said. “There are times when I come in here and I’m in need of comfort or of peace or the message of the choir. We all have struggles, physical struggles, family struggles, you name it. It’s always a great thing, even though we are the ones who are producing this, we’re blessed in many many ways by doing that, not just from hearing about others and the effect on them, but also the effect it has on us in strengthening our faith and bringing comfort and strength to us.”

To honor the 5,000th episode of “Music and the Spoken Word,” Choir Director Mack Willberg brought back a few things from the first broadcast in 1929.

“I went back and reviewed the repertoire that was sung for the very first broadcast,” Wilberg said. “In reviewing that, I discovered that one of the hymns that was sung in that first broadcast was “The Morning Breaks, the Shadows Flee.” We are opening the broadcast with that hymn.”

For part of the show, Wilberg used the same conducting baton used by Anthony Lund, the choir’s first director.

“In that era, a conductor’s baton was much longer than what we use now,” Wilberg said. “I almost equate it with a pointer that you use to point to the blackboard or something. So I said, ‘well I better try it out, see if I can make it work.'”

Choir officials also had Craig Jessop, a former choir director, come and lead the choir and orchestra as they performed “Consider the Lilies.”

‘Music and the Spoken Word’: Answering prayers, renewing testimony, through music

Members of the Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square say the 5,000th episode was also a special experience for them.

Karyn Tripp has been in the choir three-and-a-half years, saying its always been her dream to sing with the choir and every week she feels like her prayers are answered through the music.

“I thought it was a really special experience,” Tripp said. “For me it made me think a lot about those who have gone before, the many generations of people that have sung in this choir and the impact that their singing and their music has had on so many people. To be able to be a small part of that history was really special to me and to know that my one voice can make a small difference to those that are listening.”

Choir member Kyle Woodruff believes he’s the first blind person to sing in the choir. He said it’s been wonderful to be part of history.

“It was awesome to not only have Mack and Ryan up there, but they also asked Craig Jessop to conduct ‘Consider the Lilies,'” Woodruff said. “I think that the story and the message very well wove together to bring hope and comfort for “Consider the Lilies,” because we’re all the lily. We’re all the lamb, we’re all the bird, the sparrow.  We’re all different parts of the people that God considers and not that he doesn’t consider any of us different or less or all at different times but sometimes were more poignant in our lives than others.”

Desiree Syme has been in the choir for over a decade, and said the last 14 years have meant a lot to her. 

“I feel like being in the choir has helped me renew my testimony every week because I’m bearing testimony to my Savior every week and I really have a prayer in my heart every broadcast for the people there to be able to feel the spirit, for me to be able emote the message of each [song] and not just have it be routine,” Syme said.

I don’t feel like I’m very articulate or can vocalize myself very well so me being able to adopt these beautiful words and messages and make them mine is just so powerful, to be able to share these beautiful messages and beautiful testimony of the Savoir Jesus Christ.”

Now choir officials are working to expand their audience, releasing a Spanish version of “Music and the Spoken Word” earlier this year. But they aren’t stopping there.

“We’d like to be geographically heard in more countries. Now using the internet, it’s available literally around the world. We have broadcast relationships in over 50 countries,” Leavitt said. “We’ll have typically 6 million or more listeners. That’s a lot of people, but the world’s a big place and there’s a lot more who need the peace, the unity, and the sense of healing that’s available. It’s something the world needs more of, and we need to find ways in which we can expand its availability, and that’ll include working through language issues, time zone components, technology issues, all of those things present opportunities for us.”

Choir members are also looking forward to the next big milestone.

“Hopefully there will be a 10,000th [episode] long after we’re gone,” choir member Hire Panzarco said. “But whatever we do, we just build upon the people who came before us, and I don’t think that anyone ever, when this whole thing started, realized how big of an impact this could have on God’s children throughout the world. And here we are sitting 90 something years later after 5,000 episodes and we’re going strong, and we’re blessing people’s lives hopefully. I just hope that our little contribution at this time will be something that people in the future can build upon for the 10,000th episode.”

The Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square is dedicated to music that has the power to bring joy, peace and healing to its listeners. Choir Director Mack Willberg said that’s part of what makes it so special.

“Many years ago, [former] President Gordon B. Hinckley, said, ‘We want the choir to be one of the greatest in the land but always remember to sing for people.’ He said, ‘What is the use of having a great choir if no one wants to listen to it.'”