Composed by Pulitzer Prize-winning, Albuquerque-based composer Raven Chacon, Tiguex is a large-scale musical composition consisting of twenty overlapping movements performed over the span of a day.
The performance takes place September 27th, 2025, from dawn to dusk, across the city of Albuquerque.
Incorporating over 200 musicians, the twenty movements include:
● a trumpeter on Sandia Peak heralding the beginning and end of the day
● a procession of lowriders traveling from West to East along Central Ave.
● a hot air balloon with a trombonist as passenger, circling the city
● a choir with singers at different elevations on the side of the Black Volcano
● a duo of singers on horseback riding up the Bosque from South to North
● a cello and cellist in a raft floating down the Rio Grande from North to South
● an octet of electric guitarists on the balcony of the Gizmo building downtown
● singers from Sandia, Isleta, Laguna, and Acoma Pueblos singing traditional songs from the rooftop of City Hall
● mariachis on a flatbed truck driving through the Heights
● a procession thru Old Town and another down MLK Blvd
● Matachine dances in Carnuel
● a chamber quartet at 4-H Park
● a gathering of heavy metal drummers performing “blast beats” at the National Museum of Nuclear Science & History
● musicians interpreting the petroglyphs at Rinconada Canyon
● a cantata of eight singers under I-40
● the entire day will be conducted composition by Chacon’s childhood piano teacher broadcast over the airwaves of KUNM 89.9FM
Tiguex exists as an edition of lithograph prints of the score, which is in the form of a map of the city currently known as Albuquerque.
The score shows the geographic locations of where the movements will take place throughout the city, while also functioning as a temporal map, referencing the diverse landscapes of the central Rio Grande valley:
The Sandia mountains, the volcanoes of the West Mesa, railroads, waterways, conquistador trails, Route 66, and Sandia and Isleta Pueblos.
“Tiguex” comes from the Tiwa word meaning the valley between Sandia and Isleta pueblos.
Tiguex will premiere in Albuquerque, NM on September 27, 2025.
Tiguex is a collaboration with the Tamarind Institute, the City of Albuquerque Arts and Culture Office, and the UNM Department of Music, with fiscal sponsorship from the Albuquerque Community Foundation.
Support for Tiguex comes from Kris Vikmanis and Denny Creighton, the National Performance Network (NPN) Documentation & Storytelling Fund Project supported by the Doris Duke Foundation, the Frederick Hammersley Fund for the Arts at the Albuquerque Community Foundation, COUSIN, the Native Arts + Cultures Foundation, and the support of other individual donors.
To support the Tiguex project, please visit the Albuquerque Community Foundation’s support page for Tiguex, or scan this QR code:
For more information on the work of Raven Chacon, visit: