SAO PAULO, Brazil — When Alan Silva first heard the Temple Square Tabernacle Choir singing as a 17-year-old living in Brazil, he knew he needed to learn more about The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
The missionaries had brought a VCR and general conference tapes. Silva listened, but it was the music that changed him.
“I remember the feeling being so overwhelming,” Silva recalled. Mr. Silva currently sings second tenor in the Tabernacle Choir and lives in Millcreek, Utah. “And I looked at the missionaries and said, ‘You teach me tonight.’
“And a week later I was baptized, and it was all because of the music in the choir,” he said of his baptism in 1985.
Silva, 57, from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, will return to his home country this week to perform in the Temple Square Tabernacle Choir and Orchestra’s “Songs of Hope” (“Cançoes de Esperanza” in Portuguese), which runs from February 23 to March 1 in São Paulo, Brazil. (See below for information on streaming the Saturday, February 28th concert.) The choir and orchestra continue to celebrate the 100th anniversary of mission to South America.
Silva Martins and Alvaro Martins are two choir members from Brazil. Martins, who sings baritone, lived in Natal, Brazil, before moving to Pleasant Grove, Utah. The choir has two additional international members from Brazil. The first is Tarita Carvalho from São Paulo, a second soprano. And Rodrigo Domarediki from Curitiba, Brazil will sing second tenor.
Now a permanent program, 10 to 12 singers from around the world join the Tabernacle Choir for General Conference. Global members go through a similar four-stage audition process, with each member expected to sing in plenary twice within five years.
All four members are from Brazil and say it was a dream come true for the choir and orchestra to perform in Brazil.
There are also more than a dozen choir and orchestra members who have served as missionaries in Brazil, and many have ties to Brazil through family or work.
Alan Silva: Feeling the spirit through music
After he was baptized, Silva said his bishop invited him to learn how to play the piano because there was no pianist in his ward. Then he also took voice lessons.
“I loved the feelings the music brought me,” he said of the piano lessons in an interview before leaving for Brazil this week.
He served as a missionary in Curitiba from 1992 to 1994. He married his wife in 1995 and celebrated their 31st wedding anniversary on February 17th. The family, including two daughters, then moved to São Paulo and then to the United States.
“It’s very easy to feel the Holy Spirit through music, especially sacred music,” Silva said. And as a member of the choir, I share my testimony of Jesus Christ and the gospel through music.
When Silva and his family moved to the United States, he attended a broadcast of “Music & the Spoken Word” and heard a choir in person for the first time, which he said was one of the “most exciting things that happened in my life.”
He wanted to audition, but was worried about his English skills. He also worked nights at the time. A few years later, in 2015, he applied to join the choir and was unsuccessful, but received a letter telling him what he needed to work on. Eight years later, he auditioned again and was accepted. He has been singing in the choir since 2023.
“Brazil is a beautiful country, but it faces many challenges that are difficult to overcome,” Silva said. “But they’re doing it and doing it and being happy. I think the choir brings them more happiness and hope.”
Alvaro Martins: Feeling God’s love through music
After passing an audition, Martins began singing with the Tabernacle Choir in 2022.
“I was in the choir, and it was my lifelong dream,” said Martins, 43. But a few months later he had to return to Brazil for work.
He was then invited to be part of a pilot group of worldwide members who will sing with the choir during general conference in April 2023.
Mr. Martins will return for general conference in October 2025. During that time, he worked with the company to obtain a visa and return to the United States. The father of two, who lives in Pleasant Grove, said he has been singing in the choir for three months now.
“Music was one of the things that brought me closer to God as a child,” Martins said.
Martins’ mother joined the church in Brazil’s Rio Grande do Norte state before he was born and is one of the pioneer members in the area.
“She was saving money to travel to the Brazil Temple in Sao Paulo every year,” he said of a trip that consisted of a three-day trip there, a week working at the temple, and a three-day return trip.
When Martins was a teenager, his mother helped him save money so he could attend the temple.
He also remembers singing in the stake choir with his aunt and the elation he felt through music. The same aunt encouraged the Martins to learn to play the piano so they could have an accompanist for sacrament meeting. I started with the melody and learned one part at a time. One key was wrong and he had to relearn some of it.
Martins, who was serving a mission in Ribeirão Preto, Brazil, was in the conference center’s choir loft when the late President Russell M. Nelson announced that he would build a temple in the Brazilian city of Natal in 2023, where he lived. Martins was then invited to conduct the choir at the groundbreaking ceremony.
He wants people who go to his concerts to leave knowing “that God exists, that He loves them, that He wants them to love their neighbors and do good in the world.”
Global member: Music is “a sacred way of witnessing”
Carvalho and Domaredi were part of the April 2023 pilot group. Domaredi returned to general conference in April 2025, and Carvalho also sang in general conference in October 2025.
“I never thought I would be able to be a member of a choir while living in another hemisphere, or see a choir perform in my country, much less participate in a choir performance for my people,” said Domaretsky, 31.
He spoke of how he has seen the choir “do everything in its power to help members of the Church around the world feel included and recognized.”
He wants those who attend his concerts, whether in person or virtually, to feel the love of our Savior Jesus Christ. “The message the choir is conveying is a message of hope, a hope that comes through the love of Christ,” he wrote in an email to Church News.
Carvalho, 38, said: “For me, music is a sacred way to bear witness to Jesus Christ. Being able to do so through the choir in Brazil feels like a special and tender blessing. It’s a moment where love for my country and my testimony of the Savior come together in a very personal way.”
Carvalho, who has a background in choral conducting, said that expectations are already high for choir and orchestra concerts.
“This choir carries a message of faith and love that invites people to draw closer to the Savior,” she wrote in an email to Church News, adding, “Through sacred and moving music, it will be a sacred opportunity to draw closer to the Savior and feel His invitation to place our hope in Him.”
How to watch
The Tabernacle Choir and Orchestra will perform on Friday, February 27th at the same venue where they performed in 1981, Giñacio do Ibirapuera. Saturday, February 28th. Tickets for the concert are being distributed.
The concert, which will take place on Saturday at 6pm Brasilia Standard Time and 2pm Mountain Time, will be streamed live on the Tabernacle Choir’s YouTube channel.
More than 500 watch parties are planned across Brazil.
