Columba's Episcopal Church in Washington, and he also wrote Christmas songs and other works for the Choral Arts Society. In May, the 190-voice choir sang his "Choral Fanfare for an Anniversary" at its 40th anniversary concert at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

After the performance, which featured opera star Samuel Ramey, Pickard came out on stage to take a bow, even though he was ailing from cancer. He died Oct. 1 at age 62.

Whether he was working on international development projects or composing a musical work, Pickard managed to find time to make life better for other people.
He was "genial, friendly, with an omnipresent smile," said Norman Scribner, artistic director of the Choral Arts Society. "I would be hard-pressed to keep up with him.

He was a master of multitasking."
"He had a rather devilish sense of humor, which made him incredibly fun to be with," said Doug Lapp, a longtime friend who invited Pickard to New Year's Eve jam sessions in the Blue Ridge Mountains. "He enjoyed life immensely.

"
Pickard was born in Leicester, England, and received degrees in architecture and civic design from the University of Liverpool. Taken with jazz at an early age, he formed a combo in his teens. He came to the United States in 1968 for graduate study at the University of Illinois, where he received a master's degree in urban planning.

He then moved to Washington, where he worked on early plans for Metro's underground stations. He and his wife, Patricia, who had known each other since childhood, lived in England for two years before settling for good in Bethesda in 1977.
As an architect and urban planner, Pickard had key roles in downtown renewal efforts in Alexandria, Annapolis and Gaithersburg.

He helped design the Loudoun County developments of Lansdowne and the Broadlands, and he evaluated sites for a Montgomery County performing arts facility, which ultimately led to the opening of the Music Center at Strathmore.
On overseas projects for the World Bank and the U.S.

Agency for International Development, Pickard sometimes worked in strife-torn lands. One of his most difficult assignments came in 1992, when he went to Armenia to help rebuild housing after an earthquake. He arrived at the capital of Yerevan during a harsh winter and lived for months in a bare hotel room with no electricity or running water.

Yet, in less than a year, he held a design competition for local architects, found generators to produce electricity and hired locals to manage the program.
"He was just so dedicated to his work and to the Armenians," said Adrienne K. Nassau, who led the World Bank reconstruction effort.

"The project was very successful and accomplished more than we thought it would."
In Russia, where Pickard spent the better part of three years on one of that nation's first Western-style planning efforts, he attended concerts, ballet and the opera -- and had his keyboard as a steady companion. He composed parts of "Totally Prodigal," a musical for St.

Columba's that featured 40 tap-dancing pigs, while in Russia.
In 1997, when his daughter, Claire, was married at Washington National Cathedral, Pickard composed a special wedding anthem, sung by a 30-voice choir and accompanied by the cathedral's pipe organ.
"He was a superb composer who kept getting better and better," said Scribner, the Choral Arts Society's artistic director.

"He had an enormous natural talent that no one can manufacture."
Pickard was a skilled draftsman with beautiful handwriting who designed his family's Christmas cards and often wrote commemorative odes drawn from his love of poetry. He composed songs for the weddings of friends and for the baptisms of his two granddaughters.

In his final months, as his illness worsened, he found time to join his older granddaughter, Kate, on jaunts around Washington -- and to teach her first lessons on piano.

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