Concert

We're in the midst of concert season for our ragtag little choir. Last night was our third of four concerts, this one held at the place where we rehearse every week in the dining room of a German Catholic bed and breakfast that used to be a convent. The dining tables were moved to the back and chairs were set up auditorium style and we stood against the large mahogany framed windows and sang to a very receptive audience of guests and staffers, people who were walking by on the street and saw the sign, friends of the singers, and a handful of artists from the neighborhood, who apparently use the guest house's common areas as a public gallery for their rather amazing work. I did wonder when we first began rehearsing there how an unpretentious guest house had such incredible sculptures just sitting out like that. I decided maybe these were loaned artifacts from the super wealthy Catholic church's private art collection. Funny how we make up stories in the absence of knowing what is.

The director of the guest house is a very amusing older man, eccentric and generous and a little lost in his train of thought, quick to laugh and absolutely delighted by our choir being part of his programming. So much so that he had his staff put out refreshments for us in the living room before our pre-concert rehearsal, trays of cookies and fruit, with bottled water, sodas and a big scrolly silver and brass coffee urn. After the concert, there was a lovely wine and cheese reception, hosted by a roguishly handsome art dealer who lives across the street from the guest house and is the person who convinced its director to turn it into a public gallery. He flirted outrageously with everyone, women and men, old and young, and we all felt very welcomed and charmed.

Our new rehearsal digs might not have the architectural splendor of our old digs, but our hosts could not be friendlier. So what if we're rehearsing in a dining room? With all that wood, the acoustics are good. I'm also just enough of an art whore to enjoy the fact that it's a hangout for real honest-to-God-doing-the-work local artists. I loved their shaggy haired shabbiness, the artists I mean, and even though I knew many of their names, they all carried themselves humbly, as if they remembered being unknowns, or maybe even thought they still were, as if they were grateful just to be able make art, and then take a break to come listen to a bunch of rather quirky singers for free.