I went to the first hour of Thursday night choir rehearsal before I returned home to catch the 11:30 pm flight to Seattle, with a three hour layover in San Francisco. Both of my flights were early, and Scott Fikse, former Director of Music and Liturgy at the Lutheran Church of Honolulu, picked me up from the Seatac airport. It was a gorgeous day in Seattle, with sunshine, clear blue skies and no rain! A little on the cool side (high of 51° F. and a low of 46° F.) but great weather for Seattle!

We immediately went to lunch at a Malaysian restaurant called Kedai Makan, and both of us thought the food was great, with very interesting flavors.

Scott next took me to All Pilgrims Christian Church, a United Church of Christ congregation where he has taken on a part-time conducting job. Last week he actually played the organ, but needed my help to set up some registrations, which I was happy to do! The interior of the church is unusual in that the congregation sits not in pews but at round tables and chairs. However, there are pews in the building, but they are not used.

The next stop was the University of Washington Department of Music, a Gothic-style building built in 1950. That means my husband, Carl Crosier, went to school in this very building! (Carl graduated from the University of Washington in 1969.) We stopped first in the Music Library, then I watched Scott conduct a choir rehearsal. I was most impressed! Not only with the choir, which sang three challenging, contemporary pieces — but with Scott’s conducting, and the different colors he was able to achieve with the choir. His conducting gestures are extremely precise and efficient. He told me afterwards that he has learned to increase the tonal palette of a choral group, and has an expanded library of expressions to use in communicating those colors to a choir.

At several points he asked the choir to repeat a section, and they were able to start without getting a pitch!

The last stop was finding the apartment I booked which will be my home away from home for the next three nights. It’s about 5-6 blocks away from St. Mark’s Cathedral where I’ll be attending two concerts in honor of composer Peter Hallock’s 100th birthday.