Violinist Reginald Beales, 89, one of Utah's most distinguished musicians, died July 1 in Salt Lake City.

Beales died at the home of his daughter, Jeanette Holt, where he had been staying for the past year since he retired from teaching violin.Mr. Beales was born Oct. 10, 1898, in Bradford, Yorkshire, England, and came to Utah in 1915 at the age of 16 with his parents and two sisters, who were LDS Church converts. They settled in Lewiston, Cache County.

Mr. Beales began playing the violin when he was 8 and performed background music for silent movies in England when he was 14. After coming to Utah, Mr. Beales went on a church mission to the Eastern states, then studied violin in New York City and came back to Salt Lake City to conduct the orchestra at the American Theater on Main Street.

He taught violin at the McCune School of Music for 25 years, until the school closed. In the aftermath of the Great Depression of the 1930s, he organized and conducted the Federal Music Project Symphony Orchestra, which traveled throughout Utah during the late 1930s and early 1940s and was the forerunner and nucleus of the Utah Symphony.

After World War II, Mr. Beales played in concerts and on radio programs for many years and taught numerous students to play the violin. From 1966 to 1968 he and his wife, Artimesia Jensen, who died three years ago at the age of 85, went on a church mission to Scotland. In 1973, he was honored by Gov. Calvin L. Rampton and the University of Utah for his outstanding service to music in Utah.

Funeral will be Tuesday at noon at the Eighth Ward Chapel of the Grant Stake, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 3400 S. 11th East, Salt Lake City. Burial will be at Elysian Burial Gardens, 1075 E. 4580 South, Salt Lake City. Friends may call from 6:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. Monday at 4670 Highland Drive, Holladay, or at 11 a.m. Tuesday at the Eighth Ward Chapel.