Yesterday afternoon, Patsy Fala, Joey’s mom, graciously picked me up from my downtown Honolulu apartment and drove me to the airport. My flight to Chicago left about 4:45 pm and arrived at the ungodly hour of 4:21 am Chicago time where the captain announced it was a frigid 16 degrees F.! A couple hours later I was on a plane to Indianapolis, then a bus shuttle to Bloomington where I was the only passenger in a 25-seat van. We arrived at Indiana University’s Memorial Union almost half an hour early due to the driver going 70 mph while looking at his iPad and doing some paperwork! Yikes!
As we passed a number of gun shops en route, I saw a church with an outdoor sign, “When the righteous people are in authority, the people rejoice!” Dorothy, we aren’t in Hawaii anymore!
Dana Marsh took me on a quick tour of the massive Music Department buildings—there are about 1600 music students here making IU one of the largest music schools in the country. It has over 1000 concerts or musical programs per year including 7 staged operas, one of which I will see tomorrow night.
Within half an hour of my arrival we attended a gorgeous recital of John Dowland songs by tenor Aaron Sheehan elegantly accompanied by lutenist Nigel North, the 453rd concert of the school year.
I have heard Aaron perform a number of times at the Boston Early Music Festival and he in fact was the recipient of a 2015 Grammy Award for best opera performance. His voice has been called “superb: his tone classy, clear and refined, encompassing fluid lyricism and ringing force.” It was definitely first rate music-making.
After the recital we were walking back to Dana’s office, when I heard someone call out: Kathy! Kathy Crosier! You won’t believe who it was—Zen Kuriyama from Honolulu! Zen’s tenure in the Lutheran Church of Honolulu choir was legendary, but he happened to join after I retired. He and I had corresponded following Carl Crosier’s death, and become Facebook friends but we had never met in person until now. I certainly did not know beforehand that he was going to be here in Bloomington! Zen was on campus to audition for entrance into the choral conducting program, for his second master’s degree In music.
