Darger played with the Utah Symphony for seven decades from 1942 to 2012
Frances Darger, a violinist who served as one of the longest employed musicians with the Utah Symphony, died on 30 July 2024 of natural causes. She was 99.
Darger was born Frances Edna Johnson in Salt Lake City, UT, on 30 November 1924, as one of five sisters. Darger joined the Utah Symphony in 1942, aged 17, as one of the very few female players in the orchestra. The orchestra was called the Utah State Symphony Orchestra at the time and was only two years old.
By the time she retired in 2012, aged 87, her tenure was considered one of the longest of any permanent professional orchestra musician anywhere in the world. Her career highlights with the orchestra included performing at the base of the Acropolis in Athens in 1966, as well as at the opening ceremony of the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.
Aside from her orchestral career, Darger and her sisters formed a swing quintet called the Johnson Sisters and travelled to Los Angeles near the end of the Second World War in 1945 to pursue their singing career for one year. Darger also worked as the society editor of The Salt Lake Telegram until her first child was born and continued to write articles about houses in Salt Lake City during the 1950s.
Darger is survived by her three children, twelve grandchildren and fifteen great-grandchildren. Her funeral will be held on 30 August 2024. In lieu of flowers, the family has asked that donations be made to the Utah Symphony.
Watch an interview with Frances Darger from 2014:
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