Queer Places:
Maxingstraße 46, 1130 Wien, Austria
Trauttmansdorffgasse 27, 1130 Wien, Austria
Villa Alban Berg, Alban Berg-Weg 1, 8530 Trahütten, Austria
Friedhof Hietzing
Hietzing, Wien Stadt, Vienna (Wien), Austria
Helene
Karoline Berg , birth name
Helene Karoline Nahowski
(born July 29, 1885
in Vienna
, Austria-Hungary
; died August 30, 1976
in Vienna) was the wife of the composer Alban Berg .
Smaragda Eger-Berg
expressed undisguised interest for Helene, reason of
suspicious and obvious
jealousy by her brother Alban.
Officially, Helene was the daughter of Franz and Anna Nahowski . However, it can be assumed that Franz Nahowski was only her nominal father. The biological father is most likely Emperor Franz Joseph I , with whom Helene's mother had a longstanding relationship. Anna Nahowski's published diaries contain no evidence that the emperor was Helene's father; however, when she received a high severance payment, she had undertaken to remain silent about her relationship with Franz Joseph.
Personalities such as Alma Mahler-Werfel , Peter Altenberg , Bruno Walter and Soma Morgenstern mentioned Helene Nahowski as a biological daughter of the Emperor Franz Joseph I in various publications. Even in Viennese society at that time, it was considered an open secret that Helene was the daughter of the emperor and not Franz Nahowski.
Helene Nahowski grew up in Maxingstrasse in the Vienna suburb of Hietzing (the 13th district in Vienna from 1890) and studied singing. In 1906 she met the composer Alban Berg (1885-1935), whom she married in 1911. The marriage remained childless. The couple moved into a rental apartment in the 13th district, Trauttmansdorffgasse 27, which Helene's mother Anna Nahowski set up for them. Helene Berg lived there until her death; today the Alban Berg Foundation is located at this address. [1]
From 1910, Helene and her husband spent the summer holidays in the house of the Nahowski family, the Alban-Berg-Villa in Trahütten in southwestern Styria, which was later named after the composer. A number of Alban Berg's works were also created there. [2] In June 1968, at the initiative of the Austrian musicologist Harald Kaufmann, a commemorative plaque was unveiled in Trahütten attended by Helene Berg. [3]
Helene Berg was instrumental in increasing the fame of her late husband, whom she survived for more than 40 years. She was his heir and administrator of the author's rights. To this end, she founded the Alban Berg Foundation in 1968, which serves to foster the memory of the composer, enables and publishes scientific work and awards scholarships for music students. Their position on Alban Berg's unfinished opera Lulu was controversial . She forbade the completion in her will and forbade the view of Berg's score sketches. The three-act version of Lulu, orchestrated by Friedrich Cerha, was only possible through a compromise between the Alban Berg Foundation and the Vienna Universal Edition 1979 premiered at the Paris Opera .
Helene Berg was buried in her husband's grave in the Hietzingen cemetery . The Zurich Central Library maintains a rich correspondence between her and the music writer Willi Reich , who has published two important monographs on the composer. [4]
My published books:
