Thirty years ago, I first landed in Salt Lake City to audition for the Utah Symphony, a 22-year-old violinist embarrassingly oblivious of anything about Salt Lake City other than that it had a great orchestra and was home of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Two things took my breath away that first visit, their impression seared into my memory — the magnificence of the mountains and the transcendent beauty of Abravanel Hall. I remember vividly walking out onto the Abravanel Hall stage for the first time, so distracted by the opulent chandeliers and the warmth of the gold adorning the hall’s tiers, that I almost forgot how nervous I was for my first-ever audition for a major orchestra.
Somehow the hall sounded even better than it looked — rich, warm, round and balanced. I didn’t win that first audition, but that experience playing in Abravanel Hall inspired me to try again, and I was fortunate enough to win an audition a year later. I have now performed thousands of concerts in Abravanel Hall over my 28 years in the Symphony, and its aesthetic and acoustic beauty are as startling to me now as they were 30 years ago.
At this point in my career, I have played in hundreds of halls across the United States, South America, Asia and Europe. Not once did I think, “I wish this was our hall.” When I first heard rumors of plans to demolish Abravanel Hall , I brushed it off as a preposterous absurdity.
Who would wish to tear down one of the most beloved buildi.