The following is excerpted from the Church Newsroom. To read the full article, CLICK HERE

Broadway’s Michael Maliakel and actor Lesley Nicol join The Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square as the featured guest artists at this year’s Christmas concerts on December 14, 15 and 16, 2023, at the Conference Center in Salt Lake City. Under the direction of Mack Wilberg, music director of the Choir, and Ryan Murphy, associate music director, Maliakel and Nicol will ring in the Christmas spirit with live audiences.

“We are delighted to have the talents of Michael Maliakel and Lesley Nicol at this year’s Christmas concerts,” said Wilberg. “Together they will bring the holiday spirit into the hearts of our audiences through music and word celebrating the joy that is found in family and the celebration of the Savior’s birth.”

Michael Maliakel (pronounced “Molly-uh-kell”) is currently starring as the title role in Disney’s “Aladdin” on Broadway. An award-winning Indian American actor and singer, Michael was recently featured in two PBS concert specials: “Broadway’s Brightest Lights,” alongside Broadway luminary Megan Hilty, and “An Evening with Lerner and Loewe.” He recently made his Kennedy Center debut in the critically acclaimed production of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Sunset Boulevard,” starring Tony Award winner Stephanie J. Block. Before the pandemic, Michael toured North America with the 25th anniversary production of “The Phantom of the Opera.”

Lesley Nicol has enjoyed a hugely diverse career including Broadway, the West End, movies and television. Her television career in the U.K. has encompassed both drama and comedy: “Blackadder,” “Shameless,” “Inspector George Gently,” “Hancock and Joan,” and “The Lion,  the Witch and the Wardrobe,” to name a few. She played Mrs. Patmore in ITV’s hugely successful “Downton Abbey” for six years and in both feature films.

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