They just can’t give them up.

Not audiences, but artists and administrators.

This is getting so tiresome. Your Tatler was notified the excellent Taos Chamber Music Group, a first-rate ensemble made up of members of first-rate orchestras, was giving a performance in the superb recital hall of the Harwood Museum in Taos. This particular program was gratifyingly original, Sounds of  Shakespeare, with off-the-beaten-track repertoire, as seen below.

This sort of program your Tatler jumps at and he eagerly clicked the “buy tickets” button. He was about to go ahead with a purchase until he saw the dreaded and depressing advisory: Masks required.

Ah, well, too bad, this music lover will not be attending Sounds of Shakespeare, nor any other Taos Chamber Music Group concerts this season or those following. Isn’t the TCMG or the Harwood Museum aware one can go into nearly every store and restaurant in Taos and see nary a mask? Are they not aware that even though the Berlin Philharmonic and Met Opera still have mask requirements, they are flagrantly ignored?

Insisting audience members still wear masks long after the vastly overrated COVID virus has run its course shows not only arrogant disdain for the audience, but reactionarism as well (it’s not just found on the right, you know) by TCMG and the Harwood Museum.

What a shame: your Tatler had been of the mind supporting this superb ensemble above and beyond ticket sales. That will now not be happening, thanks to the idiotic mask requirements. How many other potential donors, one wonders, have made the same decision and how much has it cost the Taos Chamber Music Group?