In October of 1987, L.N. Halliburton, writing in the Los Angeles Times, commented on then four-year-old Verdi Ristorante (which was on Wilshire in Santa Monica), “No doubt about it, there is something surreal about wrapping your mouth around a forkful of orecchiette while someone is singing anything several feet in front of you.” Halliburton went on to have mixed feelings about the food, but appeared pleased with the music. That might go partway to explain how the dining establishment is long gone, but The Verdi Chorus, formed from the ashes of this long-forgotten restaurant, is thriving.
This weekend The Verdi Chorus will celebrate its 35thanniversary with two concerts entitled The Force of Destiny at the First United Methodist Church in Santa Monica, blocks away from the restaurant that gave the chorus life.
In order to understand the durability of this group, I spoke with Anne Marie Ketchum, the Artistic Director of The Verdi Chorus. She was part of Verdi Ristorante and has been running the chorus since its inception.
“Tom Redler and several buddies in the chorus came to me,” Ketchum recalls. “They didn’t want to quit. They were having such a grand time. They asked if I would continue and I would on two conditions. That you leave all the artistic decisions to me and that you take care of all the financial decisions. We also need to audition people from here on. The restaurant owners [Bernie and Sheila Segal] wanted to leave this open to anyone and everyone who wanted to sing. If we are going to do this, I want the quality of the group to rise and pretty quickly. And we did that.”
It’s rare than an artistic director can do whatever he or she wants to do. But Ketchum was adamant that be part of the deal moving forward.
“It was totally the right decision and important to me,” says Ketchum of her requirement to be made head of the group. “I’m an artist. I create these programs. They aren’t just a conglomeration of this piece and that piece, but there is a sense of how it moves through the concert. There’s music that I love and music that I’m not all that excited about and I want to to do music I love. I also understand singers. I understand how this works and the psyche and I know what people can and cannot handle.”
Ketchum is quick to admit that she had no idea The Chorus would last as long as it has. “Absolutely not. When I first was singing at the restaurant, we weren’t even thinking in terms of a chorus. I was thinking about this as a young person’s church job with a little extra money in it. While at the same time I could have a good time and hand some of this music over to some wonderful people to try it out. But I had no idea. It turned into something way more than that. It’s way beyond where I thought it would be.”
One person who was at Verdi Ristorante and got a first-hand view of the entire operation is Chef Evan Kleiman, the host of KCRW’s Good Food.
“I remember the opening of the restaurant being particularly fraught because of the collision of a first-time opening chef (me), first time restaurant owners (Bernie and Shelia), the deconstructionist architecture of Morphosis and the complication of the restaurant being an opera venue,” she said via e-mail. “I think running a restaurant is enough of a crap shoot. Adding the music made it more likely to fail unfortunately. So the fact that the Chorus not only survived, but thrived and went on to have such longevity, is extraordinary. It’s a wonderful legacy.”
It’s a legacy that has not gone without its challenges. Ketchum recalls, “For the first years the group was a kind of a rubbing hands kind of thing if you know what I mean. The audience was family and friends. But after a while they have other things to do. Classical music is always going to be a smaller audience than popular music, rock ‘n’ roll, big time sports and all of that. It’s also finances for an arts organization, especially in these days with so many groups shutting down or having a hard time. We are fortunate that we are very strong artistically and financially, but through a lot of hard work.”
When asked if she can pinpoint the linchpin of the success of The Verdi Chorus, Ketchum, for the first time in our conversation, hesitates. “I’m stumbling here because I come off of every concert thinking ‘that was fantastic and everybody loved it and I don’t know why.’ Because I’m a vulnerable musician. I absolutely do believe in The Chorus, but what I’m saying is it’s quite amazing that it’s been strong for so long.”
And then she gets back to her usual confidence. “Choral music is a great way for people to come together, get to know each other and do something artistic they can’t do on their own. Also there is a sense of family in this group. We are the Verdi family. If somebody in the chorus has a problem, the chorus gathers around. It’s really beautiful to see this sense of community and they really mean it. We’ve got someone who is in his late 80s in the chorus and we have 22-year-olds. We’ve got all races and creeds. They are all there. We don’t think about it. We have outgoing people, quiet people and they all stand next to each other, open their mouths and let it out.”
As the 35thcelebration concert draws closer, does Ketchum have plans in store fifteen years from now when the 50thanniversary comes about? “I’m having a ball working with this group. There are just so many things that I can do with them. I have some plans in the future which I don’t know whether I’ll be able to do. It depends on how the wind blows and how I feel. Maybe some collaborations in the future. We’ll see. The future is unknown. You just never know.”