In Memory of Liza Kitchell: Volunteer, Musician & Friend

Scroll through the slideshow below for a glimpse into the magic that Liza brought to the Growing Center through her artistic talents and genuine love of the natural world.

A dedication to Liza is down below.

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  Liza with volunteer Monique Duhaime and husband Ram Kelath performing Songlines II, November 2023.

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  Liza with Yumi Izuyama at the Brazilian Harvest Festival, Festa Junina.

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  Liza with daughter Marisa (foreground) getting ready for the Festa Junina.

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  Liza playing keyboard at a live concert at the Growing Center, 2018.

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  Liza posing with her accordion out in nature.

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  Liza w/ friends Ruchika Madan + Prathima Pailoor at the Center's 30th Anniv. Garden Party, May 2024.

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  Liza volunteering at the Winter Farmers Market with Laura

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  Liza (pink wig) with the Growing Center crew at HONK! Fest, 2022.

This fall, we mourn the loss of our dear friend Liza Kitchell, who passed away in late September after battling a multi-year illness. A neighbor, artist and multi-talented musician and singer who volunteered with the Growing Center for more than two decades, Liza shared her love of music and the arts with everyone she came across.  

Liza was a devoted volunteer, over the years spending countless hours leading gardening workshops, tabling at community events, leading arts-related programs and, over the past decade or so, training the “bow makers” for the Wreath Project every October.

In her tenure, she also created a kids musical theater program, launched various arts and crafts projects that enlivened and diversified our seasonal celebrations, and engaged local musicians and artists at the Center. She eventually joined the Board of Directors, serving as an officer while working on multiple fundraising projects and actively participating in the 30th Anniversary strategic planning process. A whirlwind of creativity and ideas, Liza spent countless hours in the garden sharing her multiple gifts with all of us. 

Below is a tribute to Liza, outlining her history with (and dedication to) the Growing Center, from her husband, Ram Kelath:

Liza first discovered the Growing Center in 2000.  She was delighted to find a ‘secret garden’ in the heart of the city; it reminded her of the garden of the Swedenborgian Church in San Francisco that she knew growing up. As a new mother, she instantly recognized that this was the village within the ‘Ville that she needed to help raise her child.

As Marisa moved on to elementary school, Liza developed a summer theater and music program for kids called Wild Tails.  The first few Wild Tails programs had their weekly meetings at the Growing Center as well as their final performances. It was the perfect setting for the Wild Tails philosophy of art organically and spontaneously evolving out of nature.

During the years in which Marisa was in high school and then college, Liza had more time available to volunteer at the Growing Center, like being a Watering Angel.  A spot on the Programming Committee was a good fit with her background in music and performance. In addition to scheduling summer concerts, she also enjoyed hosting weekly singalongs and leading the community chorus at the Harvest Festival. The wildly popular Gathering of the Fairies festival in the Fall greatly appealed to Liza’s sense of whimsy.  One year she added a new dimension with a dramatic staging of the Brazilian fairy tale, “Why the Sea Moans,” performed in English and Portuguese, in partnership with dancers from the Alive Dance Collective, who donned spectacular costumes created by Liza’s friend Oh Batch.

Liza was serving as President of the Board of Directors for the Friends in 2020 at the height of the pandemic. She worked closely with Lisa Brukilacchio, one of the Growing Center’s founders and longtime Board members, to keep fundraising on track, as well as to manage the nitty gritty of operations. Lisa particularly enjoyed their free-ranging but productive brainstorming sessions. One critical strategic aim was to find the people who would help lead the Growing Center into the future and Liza was a key catalyst in helping attract a capable and motivated new generation to the board.

In 2023, as she was coming back from a difficult diagnosis of metastatic breast cancer, she found inspiration and hope in her collaboration with neighbor and friend Yumi Izuyuma in the planning of the Brazilian Festa Junina - Harvest Festival - joyously celebrated in June by both Brazilians and non-Brazilians alike.

My own favorite memory from Liza’s time at the Growing Center is from the summer of 2023, when Liza hosted weekly workshops to bring to realization her composition Songlines. It culminated in a performance by Liza, fellow Growing Center volunteer Monique and myself before a small but appreciative audience on a chilly afternoon in early November.

The Growing Center is a place that drew out the best from Liza.  She cherished it because it represented things she loved best - nature as inspiration for art and nature as a setting for people to fully express what is most deeply human in themselves.

-Ram Kelath, October 7, 2024

In honor of her dedication as a volunteer and her many artistic gifts, the Friends of the Community Growing Center, along with Liza’s family, has established a new memorial fund in her name, Songlines: The Liza Kitchell Memorial Fund. The name of the fund comes from a series of conceptual scores that Liza had planned to perform using the soundscape of the Growing Center. When you make a contribution, the money will support programs and initiatives that nurture what Liza most loved. For more information about making a gift in her name, please visit the Support Us page of our website.