His Calling Is a Notable Passion

“Kindly arise when our emperor enters the establishment,” says Leopold, the headwaiter.

Looking very official--if not exactly like Franz Joseph II--Otto Friedler makes his entrance in a Tirolean suit, a fedora with a feather, and a chest full of red and white ribbons and medals.

Stopping to kiss the hand of Leonie Brandstetter, wife of the new Austrian consul general, Werner Brandstetter, he makes his way to the front of the ballroom to a singing, clapping welcome.

In reality, we are at the Four Seasons Hotel on the edge of Beverly Hills, all pink damask and crystal. But in fantasy, we are in the Austrian village of St. Wolfgang, at the 200-year-old White Horse Inn overlooking Lake Wolfgangsee.

And in fantasy, Friedler, president of the Austrian-American Club of Los Angeles, is Emperor Franz Joseph.

It is the recent annual Viennese Luncheon of the Loren L. Zachary Society for the Performing Arts. As befits a group that exists to further opera and opera singers, a popular Viennese operetta, “The White Horse Inn,” is on the menu.

The plot has to do with the waiter’s amorous pursuit of Josepha Vogelhuber, the comely proprietor of the inn. Most of the lyrics have been translated into English by Dr. Loren Zachary. It’s one of his hobbies.

Even though Zachary insists, “I’m a physician, not a musician,” music has been a passion since he was little. He won’t say exactly how long ago that was--”I’m too old to tell”--but we can tell you that he was a medical student in Vienna when the Nazis invaded Austria in 1938.

Early in 1939, Zachary escaped to the United States and, for the next 10 years, Los Angeles was home. In 1949 he returned to Vienna and completed his medical degree. Two years later, he moved back to L.A., interned at St. John’s Hospital in Santa Monica and was in private practice until retiring in 1993.

During this time, he connected with other Austrian expatriates with whom he shared an interest in opera and theater. When he was a child in Vienna, he recalls, “Every Friday night was theater night” for his family. He was 5 years old when his parents began taking him.

“I didn’t enjoy opera too much,” he admits. He saw German composer Richard Strauss conduct, but wasn’t overwhelmed. “Even ‘Der Rosenkavalier’ I didn’t like. It was too long.”

But by the time he reached high school, young Zachary was a budding opera buff. He and his friends were regulars in the SRO section at the Vienna State Opera.

Opera was to become a passion, one that would develop into an avocation that would help launch dozens of promising young singers.

The idea for the Loren L. Zachary Society for the Performing Arts came to him about 30 years ago when he saw promising singers coming out of opera workshops at UCLA and USC “with no place to go.”

At first, it was a pretty informal thing--Zachary and a few of his Austrian friends chipping in the money for auditions and making connections for the singers through friends in Vienna. Although today there are a number of U.S. opera auditions, at that time, he says, “You could count them on the fingers of one hand.”

By 1972, it seemed time to give this project a proper name. A prominent suggestion was Mozart, who lived in Vienna when he composed most of his operas. But he was born in Salzburg. The group became the Loren L. Zachary Society.

The society held its first opera auditions at an area high school, offering a first prize of $300 and a round-trip flight to Vienna. Not much of a prize, he says with a laugh, but, “at that time there were books titled ‘See Europe on $5 a Day.’ ”

Last year, the society awarded $32,000, with the top winner getting $10,000 and a trip to Munich. This year’s recipients will be chosen at the annual competition for 10 auditions winners (five from Los Angeles and five from New York) May 19 at Cal State L.A. The event is free to the public.

Prize money comes from annual donations from society members and foundations and Viennese luncheon proceeds.

“We are not a social organization,” Zachary stresses. Small musicales at private homes are more his style. It was at such an event in 1969 that Zachary met his second wife, Nedra, whom he wed in 1975. Officially, she is director of the national vocal competition. In truth, he says, “She does all the work.” (A bonus: The travel agency for which she works donates the European flight.)

Nedra, a native Angeleno, was once a performer herself. In the early ‘70s, she sang and danced and played guitar and lute as half of the team of “Tony and Nedra, the Swiss and the Miss.” She and Tony Hartenstein, who yodeled and played accordion, performed throughout the state.

As part of the Loren L. Zachary Society team, she’s helped to launch the careers of singers who have gone on to sing at the Metropolitan Opera and in major houses throughout Europe. The roster includes tenors Michael Sylvester and Eduardo Villa, sopranos Aprile Millo and Ruth Ann Swenson, baritone Thomas Hampson and mezzo Ning Liang.

Zachary, who joins experts such as booking managers, European theater agents and classical recording producers on the annual judging panels, expects those who audition “to act, not just stand and sing.” Opera must be believable, he insists--the audience must really think that the character who’s died on that stage isn’t going to get up. “That is theater.”

And, as for avant-garde stage directors, “If they want to be original, they should write their own operas.”

Most Zachary Society audition winners are Americans or are living in America, but Europe is where careers are built. There are more opera houses closer together, and it’s easier to make a name. “They should get their feet wet there, start in the smaller houses. Your voice settles and you get acquainted with the repertoire,” Zachary says.

Knowing that European houses want young talent, the Zachary Society opens its auditions to men between 21 and 35 and women between 21 and 33. Each year, about 200 apply, most in New York.

Because “people used to complain, ‘You send all the good singers away,’ ” Zachary in 1987 founded the L.A. Concert Opera, which presents an annual opera or operetta showcasing finalists. On Jan. 21, Franz Lehar’s “The Merry Widow” will be presented in Luckman Theater at Cal State L.A.

From time to time, Zachary suggests that it may be time for him to retire, but don’t bet on it. Not as long as there is young talent needing a little push to the top.

It’s tougher than it was 20 years ago, he acknowledges, before arts money started drying up, even in Europe. “They used to beg, ‘Send them over, send them over!’ ” he recalls. Still, he knows the next audition might launch the next golden voice.