Madeleine Festival returns

Friday, Aug. 01, 2025

SALT LAKE CITY — This spring the Madeleine Festival, which was paused for several years due to the Covid pandemic, returned to the Cathedral of the Madeleine with five concerts in April and May.

“We had collaborations with major institutions that are here in Salt Lake City, including collaborations with Utah Opera, Utah Symphony, the Nova Chamber Artists and a huge performance in collaboration with the International Trumpet Guild,” said Gabriele Terrone, festival organizer and cathedral organist.

All of the concerts were very well-received, Terrone said. “It was worth the effort. It was kind of humbling to see how these organizations stepped up to help us in organizing and promoting them and also with some financial help.”

The Madeleine Festival was begun in 1988 by Monsignor Francis M. Mannion, then rector of the cathedral, who wanted the cathedral to become a center for the arts in Utah. Msgr. Mannion is now a retired priest of the diocese.

“That was really the initiative that was done with the foresight of Msgr. Mannion and then the festival kept going, while other things started developing,” Terrone said. “The Madeleine Choir School and the [cathedral] choir program developed enormously. What is different about the Madeleine Festival is that it’s not just a musical performance presentation, but it also gives space to other art forms. In the past, there have been presentations by poets, visual artists, ballet and literature. It really encompasses all the forms of art.” 

Many of those who attend the Madeleine Festival are not regular patrons of the arts, Terrone said. “The Madeleine Festival has brought in a sector of the population here in Salt Lake that usually don’t come to the cathedral, and I think many of the people that have come to the Madeleine Festival concerts had never been inside the cathedral before.”

In the past the festival has also showcased visual artists whose work relates to Native American and immigrants, he said. “So, it connects artistically with this reality, just because these broader expressions of art that are represented. I think that’s what makes it appealing to the population and somehow different from the other things that we do that are more specialized.”

Going forward, the Madeline Festival will resume its normal schedule; the 2026 schedule will be announced in early spring.