Mayor Presents First CACHET Awards for Cultural Contributions

Jeff Lockhart, a rock band drummer, instructor at and director of the school’s professional recording facility "Creatio," was presented the first Kirkland CACHET Award on Monday night at .

Mayor Joan McBride presented Lockhart the award, given for contributions by an individual to culture by the Kirkland Cultural Council. Earning the first CACHET honors for an organization was , operated by Mary Harris and Rebecca Willow.

CACHET – which stands for “Collaboration, Arts, Culture, Heritage, Education and Theater” – is a subcommittee of the cultural council. The awards are designed to recognize the achievements of those in Kirkland who foster the arts, culture and heritage.

In presenting the awards, McBride said Lockhart “in 2010 took music education to a new level” by creating a world-class recording facility at Northwest University.

Lockhart, also the drummer for the Beatles cover band Crème Tangerine, said he was “surprised and very honored.” He noted that when a new studio is finished at the school “we’ll have the largest recording facility on the West Coast north of Los Angeles.”

While presenting the award for an organization, McBride called Parkplace Books one of the last two independent bookstores on the Eastside, and noted the store owners' efforts to promote poetry, literacy and education.

Accepting the award, Parkplace Books co-owner Harris said, “We love Kirkland and we always felt Kirkland deserved the best quality of everything.”