09/26/2026
COME EXPERIENCE LORRAINE VARELA'S MUSIC AT PECOS FARMERS MARKET THIS MORNING AT 10 AM!
Pecos: Former music teacher honored for her work
Ana Maria Trujillo The New Mexican
Mar 9, 2008
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Ana Maria Trujillo Lorrain Varela came from a musical family. Her father worked for a whole month before he could buy his 10 kids a piano so they could all learn. When they finally got it, Varela said it was like their "playground."
Any song she heard was like a new toy she could play with in her playground.
"I would re-create (the music) with the neighborhood cousins," Varela remembered. "We'd learn to sing it or perform it and do little plays."
All 10 children dedicated themselves to music in some way. At least eight of them played the piano and two of them sang.
"If we would have had the backing, we could have done something like a family musical act," Varela said.
Music stayed a strong part of her life. She's a one-woman band who plays the guitar and keyboard and loves to donate her talent for any event around the community, including first communions, confirmations, Masses and funerals. But she has a favorite.
"My favorite gig is the nursing home because just for an hour, they forget where they are," Varela said. "It's like going to church for them."
She is wrapping up her fifth and final CD, made up of only religious music. She records with Steve Chavez of Española.
You can hear some of her tunes on KANW-FM. She's also made airtime on some Las Vegas, N.M., radio stations.
Her dedication to the arts through music is one of the reasons Varela was chosen as the first Pecos Woman of the Year. She was to be honored Saturday by the Pecos Community Foundation and the Beloved Pecos Gallery; the date was chosen to coincide with International Woman's Month and International Women's History Day.
"She was chosen because of her commitment to the arts, her commitment to the children of the community, her appreciation for diversity and for the way she values the culture," said Robin Reindle, a member of the Pecos Community Foundation board.
Although Varela is retired, she was a teacher for 15 years in the Pecos School District.
Her teaching career started late, she said. She studied New Mexico Highlands University and at the Bread Loaf School of English in Vermont.
"I went back to school as an old lady, sort of," Varela joked.
The best part of teaching was to "see the kids light up when they realized their potential," she said. She still loves to see her old students and hear them call her Mrs. Varela.
She was born and raised in Pecos, or "homegrown" as she put it, and is proud of her culture. Her favorite part of the community is their sense of reality.
"They never put on airs and if something tragic happens, the whole community comes together," Varela said. "Pecos hasn't really changed in appearance. We still have the unpaved roads and streets. The people may change because they have to, but their hearts do not."
Pecos is the kind of place where people will always feel welcome, Varela said.
"I love serving my community and I'm called upon to do lots of things. I visit the sick and I sing to them," she said.
Contact Ana Maria Trujillo at [email protected].
