Prominent Seattleites recall their high-school musical memories

So, what was your high-school musical? We asked a handful of Seattleites, in the performing arts field and beyond ...

I played Mrs. Higgins in "My Fair Lady" — it's the only nonsinging role, which was great because I can't carry a tune! I had a wonderful time and made many friends. It was the first time I had been part of something that big and complex, and it was good for my confidence that I could be part of something like that. Subsequently I worked on costumes for my high school's musicals and found that very rewarding as well — costumes became my career!

— Sarah Nash Gates Executive director, School of Drama, University of Washington

Although I didn't do drama in high school, I remember fondly teaching my daughter to sing "Over the Rainbow" when she was a little girl, and enjoyed watching when she played Dorothy in "The Wizard of Oz" at her Denny Middle School production and sang "Over the Rainbow."

— Mayor Greg Nickels, City of Seattle

In "Cabaret," I played Ernst Ludwig ... the one who drags Cliff to the cabaret the first time. In my school [in Southern California], we had a very good and very active theater department and just a handful of really talented and strong performers. Like someone who could pull off Sally Bowles, for instance; how many high-school students could do that?

In theater, people with entirely different skill sets are thrown together to do one thing. The success is based on everyone's individual effort being part of this collective. It's something that to me seems more satisfying than a single thing that I might do on my own. And here my job is in a symphony orchestra — and it's a good thing, because I don't think you could make a career playing viola alone with no one else ever.

— Tim Hale, Violist, Seattle Symphony Orchestra

We had a really great theater department in high school, with a wonderful drama teacher, William Corsett, and a terrific music teacher, Bob Burton. Our musicals were spectacular. I was in "The Boys from Syracuse" and "Finian's Rainbow." In "Finian's" I had a big, bluesy number called "Necessity."

My high-school experience really helped shape my worldview. It is always music and rhythms that I'm thinking when I decide what tone to set and how to direct the characters.

I really was Mrs. Darbus [the drama teacher in "High School Musical"] at Lakeside School for 17 years. And we ultimately created a theater department where everybody, athletes and academics, were in the plays.

— Linda Hartzell, Artistic director, Seattle Children's Theatre

I was actually in a band in high school. I was the lead singer doing my best Jimi Hendrix imitation. I stopped when I heard a recording and realized what I really sounded like. Yikes! I look at it this way: I avoided being an aging rocker.

— Steve Pool, Chief weathercaster, KOMO 4 TV

Research conducted by Times movie critic Moira Macdonald (a shy soprano in the choruses of "Anything Goes" and "Good News") with a helping hand from A&E editor Lynn Jacobson (lovelorn Rosie in "Bye Bye Birdie").