Evan
Stephens. He was 36 years old when he was called as the Music Director of the
Mormon Tabernacle Choir, a position he held for 26 years (1890-1916). He had a
great sense of humor and according to the Deseret News (back in the day).
Stephens was born at Pencader, Wales. He moved with his
family to Willard, Utah Territory when he was twelve. His parents had converted
to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) before his
birth. When he was a very small child his mother would take him with her to work
in the fields as she raised money to help pay to build the Salt Lake Temple.
Stephens performed in his local congregation's choir as a
boy. When Brigham Young came to visit, Stephens was embarrassed by his poverty,
particularly his lack of coat or shoes, and painted his feet black with shoe
polish. At the bowery before Young entered the building, Stephens became
overcome with embarrassment and started to exit the building but ran into Young
entering the building. Young encouraged him to sing and he returned to the
bowery and sang.
Stephens never married. He had an attachment to a girl in
Willard when he was in his early twenties, but she died in a freak accident
while in a stage performance. Later, Stephens was engaged to a woman who made a
deathbed request at the end of her brief illness that he love her through his
music.
After his death, Stephens was sealed by proxy to his great
niece, Sarah Daniels. Stephens had intended on marrying her, and arranged for
her to come to Utah from the United Kingdom in 1902. Stephens had anticipated
that she would convert to the LDS Church on coming to Utah, but when this did
not happen, he arranged for her to be his housekeeper. According to interviews
of Stephens's relatives conducted in the 1950s and the 1990s, Stephens stated
that Daniels would have made a good wife, but he would only marry a member of
the LDS Church. After Stephens died, Daniels did join the LDS Church and she was
sealed to him by proxy on 5 November 1931 in the Salt Lake Temple, with the
ordinance having been approved by LDS Church president Heber J. Grant.
Stephens studied at the University of Deseret.
Stephens used to perform also as a cross-dresser singer with bonnet and veil
to impersonate an old maid soprano. His performances were inimitable according
to the news and just like Morris Young, he had the remarkable ability of
maintaining the falsetto voice on the high notes (Deseret News). In the picture
below, we observe an advertisement about Stephen's cross dressing act.
In his book, Same-Sex Dynamics Among Nineteenth Century
Americans, published in 1996, gay historian D. Michael Quinn expresses his view
that Stephens had homosexual relationships and that these were tolerated by the
LDS Church hierarchy. Elsewhere, Quinn has theorised that the unmarried Stephens
had intimate relationships and shared the same bed with a series of male
domestic partners and travelling companions. Quinn claims that some of these
relationships were described under a pseudonym in The Children's Friend, a
church magazine for children. However, Quinn has admitted that it is possible
Stephens never engaged in homosexual conduct.