Las Placitas Church

On Sunday, Dec. 18th I played with a small musical ensemble as accompaniment to a choir for a church service. Along with me on viola, there were two violins, a cello, two flutes and two oboe players. They also had a pianist that regularly accompanies the choir. The location was Las Placitas Presbyterian Church in Placitas, NM.

The music was all Bach, starting with the Air in D, then most of the material was from a Cantata in A Minor. Although I was somewhat concerned during the first rehearsal about the outcome, the concert went off quite well and all the bumps were ironed out by the time we played in front of an audience. One main thing that had us instrumentalists concerned was that the conductor was clearly a choral musician, not an orchestral conductor. However, with work on our part (rehearsing separately, watching and listening) I think it all came together fine.

The acoustics in the church were quite good, and I can see why they have the Placitas Artist Series chamber music concerts there.

The other musicians were all members of the Albuquerque Philharmonic. The cellist, Pete Palmer, is nearly 80 years old and knew my great-grandfather, John Tischhauser because the two of them played in the New Mexico Symphony together in the 1950s! That's one of the great things about playing music - it brings people together.