Gottfried von Einem

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Gottfried von Einem (January 24, 1918 – July 12, 1996) was an Austrian composer. He is known chiefly for his operas influenced by the music of Stravinsky and Prokofiev, as well as by jazz.

He was born in Bern, Switzerland, into an Austrian diplomat family. After his school days he went to Berlin, where he studied with Boris Blacher and became a répétiteur for the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra. Through Blacher, von Einem met his first wife, Lianne von Bismarck, whom he married in 1946 [1]. They had a son, Caspar Einem (born 1948), who is now a former Austrian cabinet minister who still sits in the National Council on the Social Democratic bench. In 1953, the family moved back to Vienna.

Lianne von Bismarck died in 1962. In 1966 von Einem married his librettist, the renowned Austrian playwright and author Lotte Ingrisch. Apart from Vienna, the couple spent much of their time in the Waldviertel of Lower Austria (specifically, at Oberdürnbach and Rindlberg/Großpertholz), a virtually pristine region that clearly inspired not only his own work, but also the literature of Ingrisch.

The highly acclaimed composer died in Oberdürnbach in 1996.

In 2002, Gottfried von Einem was posthumously awarded the title "Righteous Among the Nations" by Yad Vashem [2], for helping save the life of musician Konrad Latte [3].