New voice at Latter-day Saint conference from eastern Idaho

REXBURG — The video begins with its focus on a TV, and a recognizable scene for many in eastern Idaho unfolds as the General Conference broadcast for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints begins on the screen.

“From the Conference Center in Salt Lake City,” a narrator’s voice intones over footage of the center, “this is the Saturday Morning Session of the 194th semi-annual General Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.”

As the voiceover begins, the voice of a small child erupts in joyful recognition: “Yay, Daddy!”

The camera pans to Dale Spaulding, awed and smiling, as he soaks in an incredible benchmark moment of his life —the first time hearing his own voice as the voice of the global conference.

Spaulding posted the video, taken by his mother-in-law, on social media with a caption reading: “A goal 20 years in the making. Prayer. Preparation. And a boy’s dream: ‘I wanna do what Lloyd Newell does.”

Beginning in 1990, Lloyd Newell lent his voice to the church’s conferences in addition to a weekly “Music and the Spoken Word” broadcast, inviting its listeners on both radio and television to the religious event, where members of the church gather to hear speeches and receive spiritual guidance from religious leaders.

But during the most recent conference on Saturday and Sunday, for the first time in 34 years, it was a different voice – Spaulding’s – after Newell left in 2023 to serve as a mission president for the church in California.

Spaulding was born in Rexburg and attended Skyline High School in Idaho Falls. After graduating, he DJ’d for a year at a popular radio station, Z103, before serving a mission for the church in Tempe, Arizona, from 2012 to 2014.

When he returned, Spaulding attended Brigham Young University-Idaho in Rexburg. He worked as a vocal performer for the school during his studies there, and his voice was used on campus at devotionals for years after his graduation. He married his wife, Chalene, in October 2016, and the couple welcomed their first child in 2018.

After moving to Utah, he worked for KSL News Radio from 2022 until earlier this year before landing this benchmark moment in his vocal performance career.

He began exploring vocal performance at a young age, even before his voice dropped to the deep bass and baritone octaves he speaks in today.

“Early on, I found myself doing my best to imitate film characters that I most enjoyed,” Spaulding said. “I was copying characters like Stitch from ‘Lilo and Stitch,’ Sid the Sloth from the first ‘Ice Age’ movie. I was also trying hard to get into Elmo, and even as a grown man, I still have my Elmo voice.”

After his voice deepened, Spaulding realized he could emulate the mighty voice of Lloyd Newell, who has voiced the conference’s session announcements for the past 30 years. Amid an LDS culture that tuned into the lengthy conference sessions twice yearly, exposure to Newell’s voice was unavoidable.

“One of my proudest accomplishments as a teenager was learning how to impersonate Lloyd Newell himself,” said Spaulding.

Little did Spaulding realize that nearly 20 years later, his career in the vocal performance industry would lead him to the conference center’s studio to perform the task at a time of changing the guard.

Of course, Newell left big shoes to fill, but Spaulding has every intention of carrying on his torch and looks to his own experience as a conference spectator for inspiration.

“The warm and inviting feeling that I got listening to Lloyd Newell is the same feeling that I tried to embody in the openings and closings for (October’s conference),” said Spaulding. “For me, Newell’s voice felt like being wrapped in a big hug.

“There’s can be some vulnerability when someone tunes into General Conference,” Spaulding continued. “Some people are offering prayers or even fasting for answers to challenging questions that they have. There are people that come because they literally have nowhere else to go or who wonder if God actually cares about their lives. It’s those kinds of audiences that I’m trying to speak to.”

Spaulding secured an audition, partly due to his full-time position as a custodial worker at Temple Square, located directly across the street from the Conference Center itself and the studio he would later record in.

“I’d been on the church’s radar for a couple of years,” Spaulding said. “I auditioned for other projects and was actually brought onto a previous project for the church that didn’t reach publication.”

After Spaulding applied for the conference role, church officials requested an audition reel, which Spaulding recorded in his own home. It eventually made its way in front of the church’s First Presidency for approval.

“(The First Presidency) unanimously approved my voice,” Spaulding said. “I was thrilled. This is an opportunity that I have been so excited.”

Things came together quickly for Spaulding to become featured as the voice of General Conference. “Eight days after I submitted my audition, I finished recording all 14 pieces for October’s General Conference.”

Spaulding says he spent about an hour in the church’s professional studio, a job he happily performed for free.

“I know that there’s people out there that might say, ‘You’re going to be in front of millions of people — think of how much money could you earn!’” Spaulding said. “I know how much money I could earn, but I don’t care. There is something that means more to me than the money when it comes to sharing these gifts. I believe God has allowed me to use my gifts to serve not just the church but his children, to help them feel welcome, to help them feel loved. That’s my real purpose in doing this, my real reward.”

Spaulding hopes to find more work in the vocal performance industry and even continue in future General Conferences.

“I’ll clarify that this was a test run,” he told EastIdahoNews.com. “The director of the production for General Conference wants to experiment with different formulas, with different voices. Mine happened to be a very good candidate for this.”

Spaulding said regardless of whether he has this opportunity again, he was grateful for the experience..

“I thank God for this incredible, sacred opportunity,” he said.