Herbert Häfner

Austrian conductor, born 14 February 1905 in Brünn, Austria-Hungary (now Brno, Czech Republic) and died of a heart attack on 28 June 1952 in Salzburg, Austria, during the 26th music festival there. His friend Prof. Dr. Helmut A. Fiechtner wrote his obituary, describing him as "the only conductor in Vienna who devoted himself exclusively to contemporary music after 1946... He is particularly well-known in Belgium, France and Germany, and he was awarded the Schönberg Medal in Salzburg, but in Vienna he had to contend with resistance of all kinds. He frequently conducted Das Wiener Funkorchester and the Wiener Symphoniker, but was never in a contractual relationship with either of them. Herbert Häfner lived as a freelance artist. He devoted his energy to the most difficult, most controversial field of contemporary music: the 'Vienna School', Schönberg and his circle of students." In the US, most of his recordings were only issued posthumously, generally on minor/independent labels.