Filipino singer Lea Salonga and British actor Sir David Suchet, though from opposite sides of the world, sat side by side and spoke about performing in The Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square’s Christmas concert on Friday, Dec. 16, after the first performance the night before.
They were joined by Nick Winton, the son of Nicholas Winton whose experiences of helping to evacuate hundreds of Jewish children from Czechoslovakia before World War II and later connecting with the children as adults are shared during the concert.
For all three, this is their first time performing with the Tabernacle Choir, Orchestra and Bells at Temple Square.
When Suchet, known for his television role as Belgian sleuth Hercule Poirot, came into the 21,000-seat Conference Center as the narrator, he said one of the first things he felt was terror, wondering: “How am I going to fill this?”
Suchet has spent 53 years as an actor, most of those in theaters, including those in the United Kingdom and around the world. But those theaters would have 600 seats — or maybe 1,000 seats, “if I was lucky,” he said.
“And so although this is terrifying, initially, you gradually let the space warm you up. And then they put the mics on and make you feel relaxed,” he said. “And then you find yourself working with people who are so used to doing this, that you feel safe. And once you feel safe then you can perform.”
For Salonga, a Broadway singer and “Disney Legend” as the singing voice of Fa Mulan and Princess Jasmine, the initial focus was on the music and the timing for the productions.
“But once there was an audience and once I saw that this place was full, and the energy changes, the temperature changes. And it’s like ‘Wow!’ I think with every performance venue, there’s an electricity that becomes very palpable,” she said. “I just felt grateful that I could experience it in this way — in such a wonderful, beautiful way.”
She said she doesn’t quite have the right words to describe the experience of being on stage with choir and orchestra.
“It is quite something to be surrounded by that sound and being onstage just maybe a few feet downstage of the most downstage person in the choir and to be enveloped by that sound,” she said.
Suchet said that he hadn’t heard of the choir before being invited to participate in the concert. He knows actor Hugh Bonneville, who was the narrator in 2017, who reassured him about the experience.
“My working with them was one of the greatest memories for me onstage,” he said, noting the discipline and joy he’s seen. “It’s wonderful.”
Nick Winton has been working with choir officials about ways to tell his father’s story for several months this year. Part of the narration invites the audience to hold up their cell phone lights while singing a new version of “Once in Royal David’s City.”
He said he was in tears “because when I saw the room full of lights, those pinpricks of light, it was just so moving.”
Filipino music
One of the songs Salonga sings during the concert is the Filipino Christmas song “Payapang Daigdig,” or “Peaceful World” — and it’s the first time she’s performed it.
In discussions with Mack Wilberg and other choir officials, it came up to include a Christmas song from the Philippines. Salonga consulted with her brother and musical director Gerard Salonga, who suggested it.
Wilberg then arranged it for the choir and orchestra — the first time he’s arranged a Filipino song. He researched the song and found it was “the Filipino version of ‘Silent Night.’ And that’s what gave him the idea of combining those two tunes together.”
Salonga said it’s been fun watching Wilberg during rehearsals as he pushes the performers. “He’s a taskmaster to get as excellent a performance as you can,” she said, adding, “I take pleasure in watching how a group of people are being rehearsed, and that’s actually a blessing to have someone as strict as him. At the helm of all of it, it’s been a fantastic experience.”
Wilberg praised all three of the guests and their roles in the concert, noting that Salonga “not only has a beautiful voice but I have found that she’s really a fine musician in every sense of the word.” As they’ve worked through changes and adjustments, he noted that “her pitch is fantastic.”
Nicholas Winton’s story
Suchet said he first read the story of Nicholas Winton when his agent sent him the script. He started reading it to himself and then started to read it aloud. “And I couldn’t get through it because I found myself becoming emotional,” said Suchet, who has relatives who died in Auschwitz.
Winton, 29, went from England to Prague on the invitation of a friend. He saw the Jewish refugee camps and how people wanted to save their children. He worked to find host families and to raise money for them so that they could leave the country without a guardian. In all, 669 children were relocated.
A scrapbook with the identities of the children and paperwork from the effort sat in his attic for decades until his wife found it. They worked to find a group to preserve it and Winton’s efforts were part of a BBC show in the late 1980s. The network tracked down several of the children, now adults, to be part of the show. Before the older Winton died, he was able to meet many of the children he helped save.
Nick Winton said of his father’s legacy that, “This is a story with a call to action. And that helps sustain me because, you know, trying to fill my father’s shoes is not possible. So my small part is to help bring the story to people who haven’t heard it with the message that that could have been any one of us. We just have to get off the couch and do something.”
Salonga said this story combined with the music from the concert shows her how one person can make a difference. “And I think the takeaway is that there is still goodness in the world and that there are still good people who are willing to stick their necks out for other people,” Salonga said.
Suchet added, “Most people, I hope, see it and be reminded of the goodness that we are capable of giving and sharing. … We have the capacity of being kind, being compassionate, being generous, being loving. ... We need the world to bring that to the surface a little more.”
Choir President Mike Leavitt thanked Salonga, Suchet and Winton for their roles in the concert.
“The mission of the Tabernacle Choir is to bring peace and healing through our music,” Leavitt said, adding that “throughout the world” has been added to that mission statement. “Through our partnership with PBS and through the wonders of social media, this production will in fact, lift the hearts of people throughout the world.”
The concert continues Friday, Dec. 16, and Saturday, Dec. 17, and tickets have been distributed for those performances. Salonga and Suchet will be featured in this week’s “Music & the Spoken Word” on Sunday, Dec. 18, at 9:30 a.m., and tickets are not required.
This concert will be broadcast on PBS and BYUtv next Christmas season.
The 2021 concert, “O Holy Night,” premiered on PBS earlier this week and is showing this Sunday, Dec. 18, at 6 p.m. MST on BYUtv. It will air and stream on both channels through Christmas.
