Daniel Carter (LDS composer)

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Daniel Lyman Carter (aka: Dan Carter) LDS composer/songwriter. An award winning composer, arranger, and producer, and a member of the LDS (Mormon) Church. He was born in 1955 in Caldwell, Idaho.

His compositions include "As Now We Take the Sacrament" (Hymns 1985, no. 169), as well as "A Young Man Prepared" and "The Shepherd's Carol" (Children's Songbook, pp. 166, 40, respectively). In 1996 Carter was commissioned to compose "Come unto Christ, the Holy One of Israel" for the Church's Sesquicentennial Celebration in 1997. In 1993 he received a commission to compose "Refuge and Rest" a muti-media oratorio to commemorate the Sesquicentennial Celebration of Winter Quarters, near Omaha, Nebraska. The Celebration occurred in July of 1996. Later that year "Refuge and Rest" was expanded to include the Mormon Pioneer exodus from Winter Quarters to the Salt Lake Valley. It performed numerous times in Utah in 1997 under the title "Seasons of Faith."

Carter has contributed several dozen compositions to LDS Church magazines since the late 1970s. The Mormon Tabernacle Choir has performed some of his works including "Come unto Him," "The Pledge of Allegiance," and "Come unto Christ, the Holy One of Israel."

"Shine for Me Again, Star of Bethlehem," a Christmas song collaboration in 1981 with lyricist Sherri Otteson Bird, remains a best seller throughout the LDS Church.

Carter worked as a member of the LDS Church's General Music Committee from 1986 to 2004. He traveled to regional Church Music Workshops speaking and teaching in many subject areas. He contributed an article on Church music policy to the Ensign magazine. (Ensign, September 1999, pg. 59 – 60, "I Have a Question").

His choral group, "Dan Carter Singers" performed for approximately 10 years throughout Utah and other regional locations, in churches and communitites. The group's focus was to perform new, inspiring LDS music. The group recorded one CD in 1996 titled, "Come unto Him — Music by Dan Carter."

Based in Salt Lake City, Utah, Carter has two adult children. He has over 350 pieces of music in print and continues to compose and publish. More recently his musical works focus on music for theatrical productions.