December 29, 2009

In Memoriam: Mariedi Anders
1915-2009

Mariedi Anders, a leading American concert manager and the first in San Francisco, died Dec. 26 in the California Pacific Hospital after a short illness. She was 94. She was a major agent on the West Coast, managing her Mariedi Anders Artists Management, Inc., for 50 years, right up to her death. She was noted throughout the industry for her devotion to her artists, her energy, and her determination in the introduction of new artists.

Among her clients were such well-known artists as the conductors Leonard Slatkin, Sergiu Commissiona, and Robert Spano, whose careers she launched and helped build; also, Nicholas Harnoncourt, Peter Schreier, Horst Stein, and Carlos Kalmar. She introduced the Czech pianist Ivan Moravec, then unknown here; Britain’s King’s Singers; and the Borodin and Prague string quartets, among other ensembles from the Eastern bloc of nations.

Among the nearly one hundred artists she represented at the height of her management’s activity were singers Peter Schreier, Lucia Popp, Kurt Moll, Matti Salminen, and Theo Adam; pianists Walter Klien and Alexei Lubimov; violinist and conductor Josef Suk; violinist Silvia Marcovici; cellists Paul Tortelier and Natalia Gutman; and bassist Gary Karr.

Born in Vienna, Austria, the daughter of a respected businessman and singer in the bohemian café society of Vienna, Anders came to the U.S. with her husband, Ernst, and 2-year-old son in 1938, to live at first at the home of her uncle, the celebrated conductor Eugene Ormandy. In 1944, the family moved to San Francisco and eventually Anders graduated from San Francisco State University. After helping an acquaintance produce an opera in the Marines Memorial Theater as a favor, Anders was urged by her husband to go into management. She did that in 1959, from what became its permanent office, in their Sea Cliff district home.

Ruth A. Felt, founding president of San Francisco Performances, said, “She was as invincible then as she continued to be, a strong advocate for great musicians and arts.” Recalling that in the 1960s “the West Coast was a kind of foreign land for national as well as international artists,” Felt noted that Anders was a part of the effort to bring them to perform here. “She was a fighter, very smart, and you didn’t easily turn her down.” Reflecting her dedication and focus on Eastern artists, Anders learned Russian in her 60s with the help of a tutor, language tapes, and books.

Anders merged her agency with California Artists Management in 2007, continuing to work as a senior partner. Donald Osborne, cofounder of California Artists Management, who had worked with Anders in the 1970s, admired her tenacity and enjoyment of her work. He recalled how she became “family” to each of her artists, providing them a home away from home when they performed in the San Francisco Bay Area, and traveling throughout the world to support them in performances elsewhere.

She was a founding member of the Western Arts Alliance and a recipient of its Distinguished Service Award in 1986. She was awarded a lifetime membership in the Association of Performing Arts Presenters. In her personal life, she was an active hiker, skier, and tennis player. She is survived by her sons, Thomas Anders of South Dartmouth, Mass., and James Anders of Meadville, Pa.; her sister Hanni Forester of San Francisco; six grandsons; and seven great-grandchildren.