It was a joyful occasion on Sunday as we welcomed music-lovers to the auditorium at Sleepy Hollow High School for our first live concert since November 2019.
PUBLIQuartet presented a stimulating program of their improvisations, and enlightened us all with remarks on each piece. By a happy coincidence, an article about Jessie Montgomery, the composer and a founding member of PUBLIQuartet, appeared in Sunday’s New York Times, and cellist Hamilton Berry told the audience he came across it while taking the train to Sleepy Hollow. You can read that article at the NY Times website. And you will find the concert’s Program Notes here.
We have many people to thank for making the event possible. Audience members were very helpful, responding to the emails we sent asking them to complete the covid screening form that was required by the Tarrytown School District. And a number of volunteers helped us with the entry process and in providing social distancing in the auditorium. We are grateful that everyone who came was so cooperative. And we are thankful to the Tarrytown School District administrators for working with us to provide a safe atmosphere for the concert.
Looking forward, we anticipate the same process will need to be followed for the upcoming concerts. The limits on attendance are still in place and so no more tickets are being sold for the September 25 concert. I’m sure we are all of the same opinion: we hope that this pandemic will ease and that we can accommodate more people into the auditorium. But for now, we need to remain cautious.