Qualla: Concepción (Bolivia)

Concepción (Bolivia): Introduction

Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The dust here is the color of brick. It rises in red clouds behind every passing motorbike and settles on the unpaved streets that radiate from the main square, where the paving stops and the Chiquitania begins in earnest. At the center of it all stands a church that does not belong to the dust at all, a baroque masterwork of carved wood and painted color, its facade glowing against the red earth. Concepcion is a small town in eastern Bolivia, easy to walk across in an afternoon, but it holds one of the great treasures of the Jesuit Missions of the Chiquitos, and the music archive that may be its most precious inheritance of all.

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Concepción (Bolivia): A Jewel in the Red Dust

Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Concepcion is best known as one of the Jesuit Missions of the Chiquitos, the chain of reductions recognized by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site. The mission was founded in 1699 by the Jesuit priests Francisco Lucas Caballero and Francisco Hervas, gathering the Chiquitanos, the lar...

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Concepción (Bolivia): The Church Schmid Built

Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The mission church of Concepcion was raised between 1752 and 1756 under Martin Schmid, the Swiss Jesuit architect and composer, working alongside Father Johann Messner. It is among the finest of the baroque-mestizo churches Schmid created across the Chiquitania, an interior of in...

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Concepción (Bolivia): Where the Music Survived

Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The Jesuits brought more than architecture to these forests. They brought a flourishing musical culture, and indigenous musicians learned, played, and composed in a baroque tradition that took root and never fully died. Many of the original instruments and sculptures crafted by S...

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Concepción (Bolivia): Chiquitano Hands

Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The wood that makes Concepcion beautiful is no accident of the past. The Chiquitano people who were gathered into this mission three centuries ago carry forward a tradition of craftsmanship that you can still buy from workshops around the main square or directly from the artisans...

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