20-11-1889 Budapest: World premiere of Gustav Mahler's 1st symphony in Budapest.
10-09-1890 Prague: Franz Werfel is born in Prague.
00-00-1891 Hamburg: Until 00-00-1897 Gustav Mahler is first musical director at the municipal theatre in Hamburg.
00-00-1892 Beginning of Alma's intensive occupation with music.
00-00-1892 Sylt Island: First vacation of the Schindler-family to Sylt, Northern Germany.
09-08-1892 Sylt Island: Death of Alma’s father Jakob Emil Schindler on Sylt.
00-00-1894 First short-term visit to a school.
00-00-1895 Vienna: Max Burckhardt (1854-1912), director of the Vienna Burgtheater, furthers Alma's interest in classical as well as in contemporary literature.
13-12-1895 Berlin: World premiere of Gustav Mahler's 2nd symphony in Berlin.
00-00-1897 Second marriage of Alma’s mother Anna Schindler to painter Carl Moll, who had been Jakob Emil Schindler’s assistant.
00-00-1899 Vienna: Removal to the Theresianumgasse, Vienna.
00-00-1900 Relationship with Alexander Zemlinsky.
22-01-1900 Vienna: Zemlinsky's opera "Es war einmal” (Once upon a Time) has its premiere at the Vienna Court Opera under the musical direction of Gustav Mahler.
00-00-1901 Vienna: The Moll-family moves into their house on the "Hohe Warte". Hohe Warte district.
07-11-1901 Vienna: First invitation to Gustav Mahler.
25-11-1901 Munich: World premiere of Gustav Mahler's 4th symphony in Munich.
27-11-1901 Mahler's first visit to the Moll house.
21-12-1901 Vienna: Official marriage proposal to Alma Schindler.
23-12-1901 Vienna: Engagement.
00-00-1901 Vienna: World premiere of Gustav Mahler's "Klagendes Lied” in Vienna.
Year 1903. Basel. Alma Mahler (1879-1964) and Gustav Mahler (1860-1911). The first known photographs of Gustav Mahler and Alma Mahler together, taken one year after their marriage at the time when Mahler conducted a performance of Symphony No. 2 in the Basel Cathedral.
31-07-1907 Gustav Mahler falls ill, and an acute heart ailment is diagnosed.
00-00-1907 Schluderbach: Stay of the Mahler couple in Schluderbach/Tirol.
00-00-1907 Vienna: Crisis at the Vienna Court Opera.
15-10-1907 Vienna: Mahler conducts for the last time at the Court Opera. He severs his contract. Felix von Weingartner becomes his successor in Vienna.
00-00-1907 St Petersburg: Trip to St Petersburg. Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971) is present at the performance of the 5th symphony.
00-00-1920 Franz Werfel "Nicht der Moerder, der Ermordete ist schuldig” (It’s not the murderer’s but the victim’s fault), novel.
Alma Mahler as composer
Alma played the piano from childhood and in her memoirs reports that she first attempted composing at age nine. She studied composition with Josef Labor beginning in 1895. She met Alexander von Zemlinsky in early 1900, began composition lessons with him that fall, and continued as his student until her engagement with Gustav Mahler (December 1901), after which she ceased composing. Up until that time, she had composed or sketched Lieder, and worked on instrumental pieces and a segment of an opera. She may have resumed composing after 1910, at least sporadically, but the chronology of her songs is difficult to establish because she did not date her manuscripts.
Only a total of 17 songs by her survive. Fourteen were published during her lifetime, in three publications dated 1910, 1915, and 1924; it is unclear whether she continued composing at all after her last publication. The first two volumes appeared under the name Alma Maria Schindler-Mahler, and the last volume was published as "Fünf Gesänge" by Alma Maria Mahler; the cover of the 1915 set was illustrated by Oskar Kokoschka (1886-1980). Three additional songs were discovered in manuscript posthumously; two of them were published in the year 2000, edited by Dr. Susan M. Filler, and one remains unpublished. Her personal papers, including music manuscripts, are held at the University of Pennsylvania, and at the Austrian National Library in Vienna, and at the Bavarian State Library in Munich.
Several days before the engagement, Alma and Gustav had survived a decisive turn in their relationship when Gustav, in response to a letter from Alma in which she had referred to her ‘work’ on her music, wrote her a long letter in which he straightforwardly clarified to Alma his expectation that, if they indeed married, it was his music that would now also be hers: “The role of ‘composer,’ the ‘worker’s’ role, falls to me–yours is that of the loving companion and understanding partner! Are you satisfied with it?” He knew he was asking a “great deal” and implored her to consider whether by giving up her own music for his she would then feel she “were having to forgo an indispensable highlight of [her] existence,” and closed with the admonishment: “be truthful!” Alma was at first stunned, feeling that she had lived for her music until then; nevertheless, upon reconsidering the letter the following morning, she decided that she loved Mahler and now must “live fully for him, in order that he be happy.”
Later on, in 1924, after Alma was together with Franz Werfel, she published an additional five songs, as Fünf Gesänge; one of these, “Der Erkennende,” was based on a poem by Werfel that Alma had read and set to music in 1915, two years before she met him. In an undated letter written by Werfel to Alma, at around the time of that publication, he offers words of encouragement, which seem to indicate that Alma was not at that point regularly composing but had perhaps mentioned or written to Werfel about the possibility that she would write new songs: “It would be splendid if, while revising, you might compose another song or two . . . or rework an older one, in order to fill out these three sections, but it is not necessary; even just as it is, it will be an excellent, objectively magnificent edition.”
These three publications, of 1910, 1915 and 1924, with a total of 14 songs, represent the entire oeuvre of songs published by Alma during her lifetime. In recent years, three additional songs by her have been discovered in manuscript. Two of these were published by the music scholar Susan M. Filler; a third remains unpublished.
In attempts to reconstruct Alma’s creative life as a composer, scholars have paid close attention to her utterances in her early diaries (Tagebuch-Suiten), on the basis of which it is possible to construct a chronology of 47 individual songs and three song cycles which she worked on, to one degree or another, between 1898 and 1901, and presumably the total number of compositions exceeded that. Whether or not Alma actually ceased to compose between 1902 and 1910 is a subject of scholarly speculation. What is certain, however, is that she put her considerable musical education and sensibility at the service of Gustav Mahler’s works in the course of their marriage. In describing their first summer vacation together, Alma recalled:
"I tried playing the piano very softly, but when I asked whether he had heard me he said he had, although his studio was far away in the wood. And so I changed my occupation; I copied all he had of the Fifth straight away, so that my manuscript was ready only a few days behind him. He got more and more into the way of not writing out the instrumental parts in the score–only the first bars; and I learnt at this time to read his score and to hear it as I wrote and was more and more of real help to him."
15-10-1921 World premiere of Franz Werfel's play "Der Spiegelmensch” (Mirrorman) in Leipzig. Further staging in Vienna books little success.
00-00-1922 Venice: Purchase of a house in Venice, "Casa Mahler”.
00-00-1922 Daughter Anna separates from Rupert Kollner. Later Anna marries the composer Ernst Krenek (1900-1991) and gets divorced again.
00-00-1923 Venice: Temporarily stay in Venice and Semmering, together with Werfel.
00-00-1924 Travels with Werfel to the Near Orient.
00-00-1924 Vienna: From draughts left behind by Gustav Mahler, Ernst Krenek orchestrates two arrangements of the 10th symphony and performs them in Vienna.
00-00-1924 Franz Werfel "Verdi, Roman der Oper”.
00-00-1925 Nervi: Alma in Nervi, from time to time Werfel as well.
26-05-1925 Vienna: World premiere of Werfel's play "Juarez and Maximilian” in Vienna.
14-12-1925 Berlin: Successful world premiere of Alban Berg's opera "Wozzek” in Berlin. Alma and Werfel are present at the opening night. The opera is dedicated to Alma.
00-12-1926 Prague: Czech premiere of "Wozzek” in Prague in the presence of Alma and Werfel.
00-00-1928 Franz Werfel "Der Abituriententag”, novel.
1938. 06-05-1938. Amsterdam. 50th anniversary of the Amsterdam Royal Concertgebouw. In the garden of the house of the Andriesse family, Dijsselhofplantsoen No. 16 in Amsterdam.
1940. 13-10-1940. New York, Hoboken. Alma Mahler (1879-1964). Arrival. Disembarking from the "Nea Hellas".
1940. New York, Hoboken. Alma Mahler (1879-1964). Arrival. Disembarking from the "Nea Hellas". Behind her (partly hidden) Nelly Mann, Heinrich Mann's wife.
1944. Los Angeles. Alma Mahler (1879-1964) and Franz Werfel (1890-1945) on the film set of "Guest Wife" ("What every Woman wants") with movie director Sam Wood, Claudette Colbert and Don Ameche.
22-04-1935 Daughter Manon Gropius dies. Alban Berg dedicates to her his violin concert ("Dem Andenken eines Engels” - "To the Memory of an Angel”).
00-10-1935 New York: Fall Werfel couple in New York to see a performance of Werfel's "Weg der Verheissung” (The eternal Road).
00-00-1935 Venice: Sale of Casa Mahler, Alma’s house in Venice.
00-04-1936 Locarno: Stay in Locarno. Memorial service for daughter Manon.
00-00-1936 Vienna and Milan: The house on the "Hohe Warte" is given up. Apartment in Milan.
00-00-1937 Paris: At the World exhibition in Paris, Anna Mahler is awarded for her sculptures with a first prize.
00-00-1937 Franz Werfel "Hoeret die Stimme”, novel.
00-00-1938 Milan: Alma and Franz Werfel in Milan. Continued journey to Naples and Capri.
00-03-1938 Prague: Alma-Mahler-Werfel leaves Austria to go into exile. Travels to Prague, Zagreb, Triest and Milan, where her husband is staying.
00-00-1938 Zurich, Paris, Amsterdam, London and Paris: Invitation to Zurich. Continued journey via Paris and Amsterdam to London to see her daughter Anna. Return to Paris.
00-00-1938 Sanary-sur-mer: Purchase of a renovated watchtower in Sanary-sur-mer.
00-00-1938 Franz Werfel has heart troubles again. Recuperation in the south of France.
00-00-1942 Franz Werfel makes friends with writer Friedrich Torberg.
00-00-1943 Los Angeles/Santa Barbara: Purchase of a summer residence in Santa Barbara.
00-00-1943 Franz Werfel suffers two heart attacks during a short period of time.
00-11-1943 More heart attacks Werfel.
23-12-1943 Premiere of the movie "The Song of Bernadette”.
00-04-1944 Werfel's state of health improves. Work on "Stern der Ungeborenen” (Star of the Unborn).
00-00-1945 Financial difficulties.
00-00-1945 Alma suffers from general exhaustion and bouts of fever.
00-00-1945 After the end of the war, Alma learned that her stepfather, Carl Moll, and her half-sister and her brother-in-law, Maria and Richard Eberstaller, who had all been supporters of Nazi ideology, had died by their own initiative, in a murder-suicide pact, as Russian troops were entering Vienna. (Alma’s mother, Anna Moll, had died in 1938, after Alma’s flight from Vienna.) Alma began to correspond with her nephew Willi Legler (her sister Margarethe (Grete) Julie Legler-Schindler (1881-1942)’s son) in Vienna, who attended to a variety of matters on her behalf, including the taking of inventory at her two houses, the ordering of repairs, and the mediation of legal matters. Her House Alma Mahler Vienna Hohe Warte 1931-1945 (Steinfeldgasse No. 2, Villa Eduard Ast) had been extensively damaged by allied bombing during the war. At this time, it came to light that property rightfully belonging to Alma had been appropriated in various ways by her family. Most significantly, her cherished Munch painting, Sommernacht am Strand (the gift from Walter Gropius upon the birth of Manon), which she had given on loan to the Austrian Gallery (Österreichische Galerie, formerly called the Moderne Galerie) had been sold to the museum by her stepfather, at an unsuitably low price, ostensibly to pay for repairs to her House Alma Mahler Breitenstein am Semmering 1913-1937 (Werfelweg 6, Villa Mahler). Other property, including paintings by her father, Emil Jakob Schindler, had been bequeathed, through the will and testament of Richard and Maria Eberstaller, to Eberstaller’s heir, his brother Theodor.
17-08-1945 Los Angeles/Santa Barbara: Werfel finishes in Santa Barbara the "Stern der Ungeborenen”. Physical breakdown.
26-08-1945 Los Angeles/Beverly Hills: Franz Werfel dies.
1948. Alma Mahler (1879-1964). After a performance of Mahler Symphony No. 8 at the Hollywood Bowl, 07-1948.
1948. Alma Mahler (1879-1964) and Eugene Ormandy (1899-1985). After a performance of Mahler Symphony No. 8 at the Hollywood Bowl, 07-1948.
1948. Eugene Ormandy (1899-1985), Alma Mahler (1879-1964) and Thomas Mann (1875-1955). After a performance of Mahler Symphony No. 8 at the Hollywood Bowl, 07-1948.
