Hans Swarowsky

1899
September 16: Leopoldine Swarowsky (1881 – 1970, daughter of a Viennese Police Inspector and actress at the Vienna Volkstheater) gives birth out of wedlock to Hans, and relocates, as customary at the time in such circumstances, for several months to Budapest.

December:
return to Vienna, appointment of Supreme Court Judge Dr. Ing. Otto Steiner as guardian; there is no definite clarity about the father: most likely it is Dr. Josef Kranz (1862 - 1934); Hans Swarowsky himself saw it a realistic alternative to be a son of Archduke Otto Franz Joseph (1865 – 1906, father of the last Austrian Emperor Karl I.), with whom his mother also had a liason – this ‘beautiful Archduke’ was well known for his countless amorous affairs; in 1933, Leopoldine Swarowsky makes a notarial statement declaring the industrialist Ludwig Zenk (husband of her sister Maria) as biological father – a protective claim as 'Aryan proof' for son Hans; Zenk's son Ludwig (1900 – 1949) is also a composer, conductor, member of the Schoenberg cercle and Swarowsky's closest childhood friend.

Dr Josef Kranz, banker and industrialist stemming from a Polish rabbi family in Ausschwitz, becomes over the course of just a few years one of the richest men in the Austrian Monarchy (according to a bonmot of the day, the two most influential people in the Monarchy were Franz Josef and Kranz Josef); he resides at a palais in Vienna designed by leading architects and artists of the day (until 1909: Vienna IV., Argentinierstraße 25-27, then: Vienna IX., Liechtensteinstraße 53 - 55); he also owns the ‘Paschinger Schlössl’ in Salzburg, later sold to Stefan Zweig and a villa in Cannes; Kranz adores the fine arts and possesses a large collection of paintings and sculptures, supports contemporary literature and is a music lover; during her relationship with Dr Kranz, Leopoldine also gives birth to a daughter Josephine (Joska) one year later, but neither of the children are officially recognized by Kranz – he supports them princely though, Leopoldine and her children live in a villa in Vienna’s ‘Himmelhof’ in the 13th district, son Hans later moves into his fathers palais.

Swarowsky's childhood and adolescence were untroubled until 1917, marked by Dr Kranz’s financial resources, but also through a life surrounded by fine art, music and literature and the acquaintance with the most illustrious writers, composers and musicians of the time. Swarowsky’s childhood was characterized by a magnanimously generous lifestyle as well as an unimaginable wealth of spiritual and artistic influences in the midst of the immensely iberal, permissive and modern-thinking society of fin de siécle. This social and cultural surrounding shapes Swarowsky for his whole life.

1906
September: elementary school in Ober St. Veit (Vienna’s 13th district);
Visiting performances at the Vienna Court Opera, where his father owns a box;

Swarowsky still experiences Mahler as conductor;

1907
November: first concerts at the Vienna Musikverein: Bach B Minor Mass (conductor Franz Schalk) and presumably also Mahler's 2nd Symphony (Mahler's Viennese farewell concert);

Swarowsky keeps these programs for life;

1909
Trip to Cagnes-sur-Mer, where Auguste Renoir portrays the young Swarowsky

(the picture was destroyed during a bombing in 1944);

May: visits concerts in Vienna on the 10th anniversary of the death of Johann Strauss and the 100th of Haydn;

1910
March: hears Beethoven's Ninth for the first time (festival concert for the 50th anniversary of the subscription series of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, conductor Felix. v. Weingartner);

July 29 - August 6: attends performances in Salzburg of the Requiem, Magic Flute and Don Giovanni during the 'Mozart celebration' (an early forerunner of the Salzburg festival) at the laying of the foundation stone of the Mozarteum building;
lives at the 'Paschinger Schlößl', which Dr. Kranz sold to Stefan Zweig in 1917;

September: Admission to 'k. k. State Gymnasium of the Piarists', the second oldest secondary school in Vienna (founded in 1697), teaching among others Greek and Latin and a strict Catholic education;

private piano lessons with Emil v. Sauer and Moritz Rosenthal who are frequent guests of Dr Kranz;

September 12: Swarowsky sings in the childrens choirs at the world premiere of Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 8 in Munich;

1915
First testified conducting performances with the school orchestra of the Piarists, on one occasion also for Dr. Kranz's birthday;

Swarowsky becomes friends with his younger schoolmate Wolf Lasky, a good violinist and a member of the school orchestra; acquaintance with the music-loving Laszky family;
Swarowsky (piano), Wolf (violin) and his sister Julia (cello) play piano trios;

1916
Swarowsky gets acquainted with Dr. Friedrich Eckstein, one of Bruckner's closest confidants,
many conversations about the correct understanding of Bruckner's music follow over the coming years.

1917
March: sensational trial against Josef Kranz for supposedly overpriced prices for army deliveries; Kranz is acquitted subsequently at second instance.

March 10: ‘Emergency A-Levels’ (Notmatura: earlier date and less extensive exams) to allow recruitment to the army.

April 10: convocation (at 17 ½ years) as 'one-year volunteer' (for secondary school graduates the way to officer's rank) in the k. u. k army to a training company in Brno (conclusion Sept. 29);

December 3: transfer to the Italian front;

1918
April: wounded twice during fights (Infantry Regiment 49) on the Brenta plateau (Dolomites), 

a first medal ('bronze medal for bravery');

October 31: at the end of the month Swarowsky is taken prisoner by the Italians, escapes  and spends a year on a large northern Italian estate, falls in love with the Padrone's daughter, a daughter is born;
during this year Swarowsky learns Italian: 'I know no other non-Italian, who speaks as perfectly as an Italian!' (G. Sinopoli about Swarowsky); throughout his life, Italy and the art of the Italian Renaissance remain the a passion;

1919
October 27:  official release from the army on return to Vienna.
November: studies history of art and philosophy (among others with Max Dvorak) at the Vienna University

1920
Swarowsky falls in love with Julia (Lia) Laszky (1918 - 1974);
Swarowsky meets the psychologist Wilhelm Reich (his rival in love) via Julia Laszky, Reich introduces them to Freud's lectures at the Psychoanalytical Society; at this point Swarowsky actually wants to become a psychoanalyst - but also wavers between music and history of art;
piano studies with Eduard Steuermann (a friend of the Laszky family) and Feruccio Busoni;
Swarowsky attends over the following years the literary lectures of Karl Kraus, which leave a deep impression;

April 10: Swarowsky hears Mahler’s third symphony for the first time and due to this impression decides to become a conductor – this symphony should take a special place throughout his entire life; for his 21st birthday, Julia Laszky acquires an Edition of Mahler’s 3rd symphony from Universal Edition as a birthday present; Swarowsky will conduct from this score throughout the rest of his life;

June 12-13: listens to rehearsals and performances of the Gurre Lieder conducted by Schoenberg at the Vienna State Opera; he is so impressed that he asks Schoenberg for private lessons (until his departure to Holland September 1921);
participation in events (piano and harmonium) in Schoenberg's ‘Verein für musikalische Privataufführungen’, where he meets Webern, Berg, Helmsman, Kolisch, Rankl, Ratz, Ravel, Bartók, Prokofiev, Kodály. Hindemith, Pfitzner, Schreker, Malipiero, Zemlinsky, Milhaud and others;

Swarowsky studies the following works directly with Schoenberg: Pelleas and Melisande, 1st Chamber Symphony, Gurre Lieder, Erwartung, Die glückliche Hand, Pierrot Lunaire, George Lieder and the 2nd String Quartet;

Since about 1915, Josef Kranz has an affair with the novellist Gina Kaus (1893 – 1985), in order to not lose her, Kranz decides to adopt Gina – Swarowsky always had a good understanding with Gina; in her 'literary salon' he gets to know leading artists and authors such as Werfel and Alma Mahler, Kafka, Loos, Altenberg,  Kafka, Musil, Broch etc;

1921
Lessons in theory and analysis with Anton v. Webern (fee per lesson of between 1000 to 1500 crowns), who becomes a close friend; Swarowsky’s cousin Ludwig  Zenk (son of mother Leopoldines sister) also studies with Webern;

1922
With the exception of the war, Swarowsky was able to lead an almost fairytale carefree life to his heart's content. This changes gradually from now on,  and for a very long time new, even existential problems arise; later, in his score of 'Death and Transfiguration', he draws parallels to his life, from happy childhood through the years of political and economic turmoil, to the end of the war in 1945;

Participation in Webern's conducting courses in the Black Forest School;
He plays Schoenberg's Gurre-Lieder on piano four hands with Alban Berg and later also with Erwin Stein; Webern gives an analysis lecture on the work;

Dr. Kranz withdraws his financial support as a result of a family quarrel (he marries the 17-year-old Lilly Geiringer this year) and his reduced assets after the end of the monarchy - Swarowsky has to support himself overnight and subsequently also his mother;

September 1: Felix v. Weingartner, at that time director of the Vienna Volksoper, engages Swarowsky as accompanist and subsequently as chorus director, who from then on gets to know the standard opera repertoire, and also receives conducting instruction in practice and theory from Weingartner. Swarowsky's method of presenting conducting lessons in the form of 'lectures', on the basis of a score analysis with an explanation of the basic principles of interpretation, most likely goes back to Weingartner; in those years also lessons with Franz Schalk;

1923

In those years Swarowsky performs as a pianist in the famous Viennese Jewish cabarets (including the 'Budapest Orpheum'), as accompanist for Diaghilev's Ballets Russe and with singers (including Jan Kiepura);

Marriage to Julia Laszky; due to a conflict with Dr Kranz, the young couple temporarily moves in with Webern's in-laws; aquaintance with Erwin Ratz, also a student of Schoenberg and Webern, who becomes an important friend;

April-May: repetiteur for Webern's performances with the ‘Mödlinger Gesangsverein’ (among others Schubert's E flat major Mass); participation as a pianist in the orchestra of the Theater der Josefstadt (then directed by Max Reinhardt);

November: repetiteur at the royal Opera in Bucharest (until March 1924);

Swarowsky's sister Joska emigrates to the Soviet Union, where she stays for the rest of her life; she marries Theodor Valetsky, a high ranking politician, who is executed during Stalinistic show trials end of the 1930s; Swarowsky’s contact with her sister then comes to an end;

December: Swarowsky works until January 1924 as repetiteur and assistant of Arturo Toscanini for a new production of La Boheme at La Scala in Milan and he studies the opera from 'first hand'; there's no doubt that Toscanini's style of working and musical views influence Swarowsky greatly

1924
March 12: birth of son Anton; Webern is his eponym - de facto godfather - because Anton is not baptized for now;

May - June: pianist for Webern during the rehearsals of his Trakl-Lieder op. 14 at the Donaueschinger Musikfest;

1925
June - July: 2nd Kapellmeister at the 'Schloßtheater  Schönbrunn';

July 31: Kapellmeister (until July 1927) at the Vienna Volksoper, Leo Blech becomes, after Weingartner departure, the principal conductor (Swarowsky meets him 10 years later again at the Berlin State Opera); Josef Krips and Karl Rankl are his conducting colleagues;

September 10: first performacne with Les Contes d’Hofmann;

1926
First translation of an opera libretto: Swarowsky improves the German version of Tosca for the Volksoper;

July - December: Kapellmeister at the Royal Opera Bucharest

1927
July: end of engagement at the Volksoper after about 135 performances, mostly of operettas, but also operas: Ihpigenie in Aulis, The Evangelist, Martha, Rigoletto, Rienzi;

August 1: after illness-related initial difficulties, a convincing performance at the Württembergische Landestheater Stuttgart - Swarowsky becomes 3rd Kapellmeister;

September 10: conducts his first Stuttgart performance (Barber of Seville);

Swarowsky meets the Stuttgart the ballet dancer Maria Gerlach (1909-1974), who later becomes his second wife; divorce from Julia Laszky, with whom he stays in contact for life; during the following years Julia lives with the psychologist Wilhelm Reich, whom she has known for many years; son Anton remains with the Laszky family in Vienna; Swarowsky meets representatives of the Bauhaus movement, especially Oskar Schlemmer (whom he had met earlier), who also designes sets for the Landestheater

1928
Unsuccessfully seeks admission to the Masonic Lodge 'Wilhelm zur aufgehenden Sonne' in Stuttgart, in 1933 the Gestapo confiscates all papers of the lodge and such has a record of all members;
Son Anton lives for one year in Stuttgart, his mother travels to the Soviet Union for a longer period; Gina Kaus makes a longer visit to Stuttgart;

October 25: complains for the first time (in a letter to director Kehm) about physical discomfort caused by stomach ulcer;

October 28: conducts the German premiere of Dvoraks Rusalka in his own translation;
Swarowsky also conducts symphony concerts, among others Bruckner's Symphony No. 9, which he rehearses under the guidance of Franz Schalk;

Swarowsky conducts a wide repertoire over the years, increasingly also operettas by Offenbach (as he did at the Volksoper in Vienna, following the dictum of Karl Kraus), but is increasingly dissatisfied with it: Franz Konwitschny is engaged simultaneously with him as repetiteur and becomes 1st Kapellmeister (without previous experience); tensions arise with this competition, thanks to Konwitschnys intrigues against Swarowsky there are also difficulties with representatives of the orchestra and the choir: it doesn’t help that Swarowsky is artistically uncompromising and too generous with his sarcastic comments;

1929
Beginning of his 'journalistic' activity: Swarowsky writes regularly extensive program notes for the opera house on questions of music, dramaturgy, direction, translation of librettos;

Swarowsky is commissioned by Kehm to scout new singers and visits several opera houses in Germany and Austria;

The economic decline of Dr Kranz continues, his vast collections are being auctioned, entire cataloques are printed on this occasion;

1930
July-August: Swarowsky teaches for the first time piano accompaniment (Lied and opera accompaniment) at the prominently cast Austro-American Summer Courses at Mondsee Castle, whose owner, Countess Almeida, is friends with him; lecturers were among others W. Kienzl, W. Korngold, L. Wallerstein, O. Strnad, O. Sevcik, C. Cassado, Béla Bartók teaches piano

October 18: Premiere of ‘Shadows over Harlem’ (O. Dymow and B. Reinitz) - this premiere erupts in one of Germany's biggest theatrical scandals with brawls in the audience, Nazi agitators and police in front of the theater;

November: a new intrigue against Swarowsky by Konwitschny leads to a very problematic situation in the Landestheater

1931
July 31: the contract with the Landestheater Württemberg is reportedly dissolved early because of 'austerity measures due to the global economic crisis'; in fact, it was Swarovskys numerous hostilities in and out of the opera house (he was repeatedly reported by supporters of the NSDAP) and the resulting tensions; Intendant Kehm values Swarowsky as an artist highly and recommends him several times to other theaters, in 1935 also to the Berlin State Opera;

December: Swarowsky is invited back to Stuttgart for a production of Caramba (world premiere of the operetta by H. Dransmann)l

September: sensational divorce of Dr. Kranz in Vienna, whose second marriage was declared invalid; his first wife, Gisela, lives thereafter until the end at the Liechtensteinstrasse palace; she is deported to Theresienstadt by the Nazis and dies there;

1932
June - October: Swarowsky remains without engangement, due to the economic crisis, all theaters suffer from cuts; Swarowsky becomes music director and stage director at the Reuss Theater Gera; in the first year of this engagement, Swarowsky works not as a conductor but as a director; among others Land des Lächelns, Wiener Blut, Gasparone

1933
February 18: Tour of the Vienna Volksopera to Cairo, Swarowsky conducts the Rosenkavalier;
Returning from Cairo, he and Maria Gerlach are arrested by the Gestapo and detained for one week based on a denunciation from someone from the Stuttgart theater; Swarowsky is supposed to have said: 'This house painter will destroy Germany and the German people ...';

July 19: Mother Leopoldine Swarowsky makes an affidavit identifying the industrialist Ludwig Zenk (Aryan and Catholic) as father of her son Hans, Zenk is married to Leopoldine's sister, whose son Ludwig (1900 - 1949), also composer, conductor and member of the Schoenberg circle, is Swarowsky's closest childhood friend

October 4: Swarowsky conducts his first performance again in Gera, a new production of La Bohème, followed by performances of Arabella. Cavalleria / Bajazzo, Il Tabarro, The Bartered Bride and Gluck's Orpheus;

1934
February: Application to the Stadttheater Aachen as General Music Director

February 20 and 22: successful guest performances with Carmen and Flying Dutchman;
the contract fails due to the intervention of the National Socialist Lord Mayor, who also dismissed Swarowsky's well-intentioned director Sioli; From March 1935, the position was given to Herbert von Karajan, who unemployed at the time, rejoines the NSDAP in Aachen to get the job;

April 13-16: Swarowsky conducts guest performances at the Hamburg State Opera: Tannhäuser, Rigoletto and La Bohème

April 29: Meistersinger as last performance in Gera

May 1: Swarowsky becomes First Staatskapellmeister in Hamburg (State Opera and Philharmonic), as Karl Böhm had prematurely ends his contract; Swarowsky's repertoire includes mainly Verdi, Puccini and Wagner (including Götterdämmerung) and Strauss; Oscar Fritz Schuh often directs the Hamburg productions; Swarowsky tries (in vain) to bring the world premiere of Lulu to Hamburg

September 14: Josef Kranz dies (after losing all his wealth) in Vienna; he is buried two days later, on the 35th birthday of his son;

November: Documents show that various NSDAP services start to sho interest in Swarowsky, his ‘conduct doesn’t appear to be impeccable’, first research on him;

October 6:  a new production of Gluck's Orpheus and Eurydice for the first time in Swarowsky's translation of the Paris version, which has Orpheus as a tenor;
The baritone Hans Hotter gets engaged in Hamburg this year and recognizes Swarowsky's qualities;

November 18: new production of Frau ohne Schatten, Strauss conducts the opening night;
a lifelong friendship develops from this encounter; Strauss perfected Swarowsky's conducting technique and especially the interpretation of the Viennese classical repertoire, Strauss gives Swarowsky significant impulses; Swarowsky becomes Strauss’ right-hand man ('Eckermann'), studies operas for him several times and gets to know the tone poems first-hand; both are connoisseurs of the Italian Renaissance and make numerous trips to Italy together; Swarowsky meets Strauss often while conducting at the Zurich opera, on Strauss’s regular visits to Baden near Zurich.

1935
January 1: Clemens Krauss becomes artistic director and GMD of the Berlin State Opera 'Unter den Linden' (after Furtwängler was removed because of his intervention for Hindemith); Krauss wishes Swarowsky, whom he met through Strauss, as the First Staatskapellmeister as he’s very successful in Hamburg; Swarowsky is discredited from the outset of the negotiations by Tietjen, the Generalintendant of the Berlin State Theater, because he is politically left-leaning and of Jewish descent: 'the Sparrows whistle it from the roofs in Vienna, that he is the son of the Jewish industrialist Crantz' he reports to Göring; also the Stuttgart problems are used against Swarowsky; Göring personally decides in support of Krauss and Swarowsky;

January 5: Swarowsky conducts Macbeth in Hamburg; against the applause of the audience rioting SA people turn the performance into a scandal, they demand the dismissal of the best singer of the opera house; Sabine Kalter emigrates to England a few days later; the political pressure grew ever larger: even the premiere of Hindemith's Mathis the Painter has to be canceled in Hamburg

February 13 and 19: rehearsals in Berlin with Lohengrin and Rigoletto;

March-April: Swarowsky takes over Pfitzners Der Arme Heinrich in Hamburg, Pfitzner conducts the opening night; Swarowsky meets Pfitzner personally

May 1: Swarowsky becomes First Staatskapellmeister in Berlin, with a contract until 21st August 1938; his repertoire includes above all the Italian repertoire, Handel, Gluck, Wagner and Mozart;

June 8: first premiere in Berlin with Handel's Julius Caesar.
Marriage with Maria Gerlach, not least to prove a moral way of life to the NS authorities

1936
January: Krauss leaves the Berlin Opera to direct the Munich Opera on Hitler’s order  - Swarowsky loses his most important backing and becomes the pawn sacrifice of the rivalry between Tietjen and Krauss; Swarowsky's steep career (within 10 years from repetiteur to the top of the Berlin State Opera) comes to an end;

First recordings for Decca: popular Italian arias and arias from Moniuszko's opera Halka with Jan Kiepura, whom he had previously accompanied on tour as a pianist;

February 28: Swarowsky studies Arabella in Amsterdam in the presence of Strauss, who conducts the opening night;

July 5: Cavalleria / Bajazzo: last performance of Swarowsky in Berlin; that sesason he conducted 57 operas as well as several concerts (among others Bruckner’s 9th on October 1, 1935);

July 25: Göring and Tietjen decide in Bayreuth to fire Swarowsky, because 'his employment at the State Opera is in vain'; this decision de facto means a 'ban on conducting' in the German Reich, where Swarowsky was never hired again as conductor; Krauss also refuses to engage Swarowsky in Munich; Swarowsky remains without a commitment for a year;

Autumn: Swarowsky travels for the first time to South America and conducts the Gurre Lieder in Buenos Aires

1937
April 29: Laconian Tietjen reports to Göring that it is 'impossible to bring Swarowsky to another theater' Swarowsky insists on the payment of all his outstanding Berlin fees (26.166, - RM) until the end of the contract in 1938, Göring approves of this against Tietjens resistance to end the affair

May 12 and 20: rehearsals in Zurich (Fidelio); thanks to director Karl Schmid, Swarowsky is appointed First Kapellmeister against the resistance of the Swiss authorities, who want to see a Swiss in that post

July 1: start of Swarowsky's contract as First Kapellmeister at the Zurich Opera House; his fee is 750, - francs, a bitter financial setback; Swarowsky lives in the Beethovenstraße 49 at the house of film producer Julius Marx, a friend from the Stuttgart days, who had also emigrated from Germany;
September 8: Swarowsky conducts Don Carlos, Madame Butterfly and Ariadne auf Naxos with great success

1938
January 21: Swarowsky conducts new productions of Luisa Miller, La forza del destino and Rigoletto - Swarowsky is the conductor of the Italian repertoire, while Robert Denzler as GMD mainly takes over the German repertoire

January 22: Ballet evening with de Falla’s The Three Cornered Hat and Stravinsky's Jeu de Cartes, later also Petrushka; Swarowsky meets Stravinsky, they get along well and stay in touch. Stravinsky demonstrates his aversion to a prominent conductor: he writes in Zurich on the penis of a statue 'Furtwängler'

March 12: the Wehrmacht occupies Austria, Gina Kaus flees with her husband from Vienna to Zurich, where she meets Swarowsky; she lived until then in the 'Philipphof' at Albertinaplatz, which was destroyed in 1945 by bombs, in its place stands today the 'Memorial against War and Fascism'; son Anton moves to Zurich and lives with his father, Lia Laszky has already emigrated to New York, where she runs a practice as a psychotherapist and marries the Viennese lawyer Hugo Knöpfmacher;

September 7: Swarowsky conducts a new production of the Freischütz, Strauss and Hindemith attend the performance and are very impressed; they all meet afterwards with the Zurich Intendant in the legendary Zurich 'Kronenhalle'

November 19: first collaboration with Walter Felsenstein for a new production of Millöcker’s Gasparone; Felsenstein also emigrated to Switzerland and directs several operas at the opera house;

December 17: at the suggestion of Swarowsky a new production Thomas' Mignon is put on under his direction, it becomes be the biggest public and box office success of the season

December 20: Swarowsky considers emigration: with no work opportunities in the German Reich, tolerated in Switzerland only for a limited time at the Zurich opera, which despite everything he regards as provincial; his plans ultimately fail due to the lack of job prospects in England and the US and resulting financial pressures: he has to provide for Anton’s  emigration to join his mother in New York, look after his mother and, of course, himself and Maria

Beginning of translations of opera libretti (Verdi, Puccini) into German as additional means of income; acquaintance with Hans Conrad Bodmer and participation in the deciphering and classification of Beethoven letters from his collection (today in the Beethovenhaus Bonn); Beethoven's autographs are stacked in Swarowsky’s Zurich appartement;

1939
February 11: Swarowsky complains to Krauss about his situation: fees are constantly cut, he has health problems, and in spite of all successes ‘no general progress can be achieved in developing activities beyond the call of duty …’

March 26: new production of a spectacular Carmen production with Walter Felsenstein, who (together with Swarowsky) creates a new translation where recitatives are replaced by original dialogues;

March: the Swiss immigration police - obeying an entirely 'xenophobic' policy - orders the termination of Swarowsky's contract to replace his post with a Swiss national; the Opera House undertakes everything, up to a petition to the Federal Council in Bern, to prevent this, and thus achieves a final contract extension until the end of the season 1939/40

May 19: during a 'Richard Strauss Festival Week' Swarowsky conducts a new production of Salome (directed by Felsenstein); Strauss is present at the rehearsals and leads the opening night on his 75th birthday; live broadcast by Swiss radio in honor of the visit of the Lord Mayor of London

September: Swarowsky transfers his entire fortune to a 'pound account' to finance Anton's emigration - with the outbreak of the war this account is suspended, Anton can not travel for the time being and Swarowsky loses all his cash assets: 'I feel so bad as never before in my life ... sometimes it is not enough to get on the streetcar ... on foot are my thoughts ... with Tietjen, and I get hard fists '; at the beginning of the war, salaries at the opera house were cut by 30%

Strauss invites Swarowsky to co-operate on Capriccio - convincing texts are missing for key scenes of the libretto; Swarowsky is looking for suitable French love poetry under '100 books' and finds at the end the sonnets of Pierre de Ronsard in a Zurich antiquarian bookshop; Swarowsky translates a selection of them for Strauss into German (more a paraphrase than a translation)

November 22: Strauss is enthusiastic about the sonnet and sets it to music immediately; he dedicates this first version (in A major) to Swarowsky and asks him for further text suggestions, which Krauss rejects; but Strauss insists to have Swarowsky on board: 'Vive le triumvirat'; the true scope of Swarovski's co-authorship is still unclear;

1940
January 26: Strauss vehemently advocates for Swarowsky and wants to get Tietjen the case against Swarowsky

May 30: last performance in Zurich: Madame Butterfly

May 1: Swarowsky decides despite everything, and for lack of better alternatives, to retun to the German Reich and join the 'internal emigration'; Swarowsky says to Julia Laszky: 'There is only one way left for me: to go back there. It is certainly terrible and perhaps synonymous with giving up the fulfillment of my life. ... I'm desperate, almost broken .... '

Strauss is constantly trying (quite unrealistically) to engage Swarowsky in Munich, Hamburg or Dresden as Kapellmeister or even Chef; Krauss always finds new reasons why he can not engage Swarowsky in Munich, because: 'A repetition of the Berlin difficulties would not only disturb the peace in the institute entrusted to me ... but it could also endanger the career of Swarowsky ... ',  a vehemently cynical argument.

June 21: Krauss (with the support of Strauss) manages to hire Swarowsky in the 'Reichswerk für Musikbearbeitung' in Berlin, so that he is officially provided for; Swarowsky translates among others Glucks Alceste into German, works on operettas and writes assessments of new stage works in terms of their performance and quality; he earns at least RM. 800 a month, but is seldom seen in his office and ends the activity at the end of 1942

September 1: first performance of Simone Boccanegra in Swarowsky's German translation at the Munich State Opera (Krauss conducts);
Swarowsky becomes (unofficially) Chief Dramaturg at the Munich Opera: he studies the Italian repertoire with singers (for example Hotter) in Italian (!), 'Since one soon will no longer sing in German'; he is present at rehearsals and is working on the improvement of translations of librettos (Cosí fan tutte, Simone Boccanegra, Tosca, Manon, La Bohème, Margarethe and Falstaff); Swarowsky is scouting new singers and 'discovers' among others Hilde Güden, who has already sung in Zurich

December: son Anton emigrates after overcoming countless difficulties and only with the help of his Swiss foster family via (Vichy-) France, Spain and Portugal to the USA to join his mother; Swarowsky travels specially to Zurich to bring Anton to Geneva on the train; he has Anton baptized catholic before his departure

1941
February: Swarowsky's new translation of Falstaff is used at the Munich and Vienna State Opera houses; in Munich also Don Carlos

April 10: Swarowsky is called to the Wehrmacht - but Krauss achieves his release

August: Swarowsky is assistant to the conducting courses of Krauss and Strauss in Salzburg,  teaching baton technique; the Salzburg Festival and the Mozarteum are subordinated to the Munich State Opera, Swarowsky is involved in the preparation of all Krauss productions in Salzburg;

October 25: a new production Verdi's Falstaff at the Vienna State Opera (Krauss conducts) in Swarowsky's new German translation;

1942
during a trip to Zurich (with Strauss), Swarowsky makes contact with the British consul and offers his cooperation with the Allies; he uses his contacts in Berlin to send telegrams on 'translation questions' - the code of his messages for the British Secret Service, for which Julius Marx is one of the most important liaison officers in Zurich; Swarowsky also uses private contacts to the highest levels to gather information: i.a. Otto Meißner, the head of Hitler’s presidential office; Swarowsky's busy travel might also have been helpful in this communication: in Vienna he had contact with the resistance, especially Erwin Ratz; 'The news were of the utmost importance both politically and militarily' (Josef Marx to the US authorities in 1945);

February 20: Strauss proposes in letters to appoint Swarowsky as successor of Böhm to Dresden - this proves Strauss's appreciation of Swarowsky, but was still unrealistic;

March 15: after about 18 months Swarowsky conducts again (orchestral works by Strauss) and Rosenkavalier at Gran Liceu in Barcelona;

April: Concerts in Zagreb and Budapest;

October 28: world premiere of Capriccio in Munich; the set (furniture, fabrics) was organized at the request of Krauss by Swarowsky in Paris, where he travels especially; Swarowsky also travels to Milan with the stage designer Rochus Gliese, in order to buy original Italian fabrics for a new production of Tosca;

December 10: Swarowsky manages to get a 'letter of descent' ('Aryan proof') issued by the 'Reichssippenamt', but this does not actually improve his situation;

1943
April 1: Krauss makes Swarowsky the chief dramaturge of the Salzburg Festival and thus protects him from a new conscription to the Wehrmacht; Swarowsky now also writes the texts of the Almanac and the program notes; Swarowsky assists Krauss at the conducting course in Salzburg;
He conducts Ariadne on Naxos at Gran Teatro Liceu in Barcelona

July 6 and November 7: concerts in Budapest with Schubert: The Unfinished, 'The Young Nun', 'The Infinite', 'Death and the Maiden', Mass in E flat major - a clear musical sign of the political situation

October 3: The Munich Opera is almost completely destroyed by a bombing raid;

1944
Krauss and Strauss achieve that Swarowsky takes over the Philharmonic Orchestra in Krakow; the orchestra is excellent and consists largely of the best Polish musicians of the disbanded orchestras in Warsaw and other cities; Swarowsky employes non-stop musicians from the Plaszow concentration camp ('Schindlers List') for the choir and the orchestra and provides them with apartments, food rations and permits (there was an evening curfew); some of these 'musicians' could neither play nor sing and they can only pretend - some have contact with the Polish resistance; Swarowsky, too, has such contacts, both communist and catholic-national; Dr Hans Franck (governor-general of the occupied parts of Poland in Silesia and Galicia) wants to set up a cultural establishment in Krakow from the status of Vienna or Berlin and is looking for suitable conductors: Strauss declines but  recommends Swarowsky (as does Krauss); since the Government General is not legally part of the German Reich and Franck has great liberties, Swarowsky's emplyoment is possible;

March 9: first concert in Krakow with great success

June 12: festival performances (the only ones except Vienna) to celebrate Strauss's 80th birthday;
 
June 24: as part of the Strauss celebration, Swarowsky conducts Ariadne  with a top cast (Ursuleac, Kern, Cunitz, Patzak);

June 25: Franck names Swarowsky Principal Conductor with the goal to ‘build a truly large international orchestra at the General Government's Philharmonic Hall.’;

August: son Anton lands as a US corporal in Italy, before he being deployed from Sept 1943 in the invasion of Southern France;

August 16: 'Premiere - Dress Rehearsal' of Die Liebe der Danae in Salzburg (Strauss: 'the funeral of German art'); Swarowsky has to write a report to Franck and quotes Strauss's words 'Goodbye in a Better World' at the end of the performance

September 25: end-time mood prevails in Krakow, theaters are closed, but concerts still have to take place, even during blackouts; Concertmaster Fritz Sonnleitner and Swarowsky's deputy Rudolf Erb were called to the front despite all protests and efforts; Swarowsky succeeds again to elude this convocation; Swarowsky manages to get rid of the regime-loyal director and assumes this position himself;

December: Swarowsky's apartment in Berlin is bombed out, his property destroyed, including his valuable library (rare editions and autographs and numerous sketches of Strauss)

October 26 -27: Beethoven-Concerts with the finale of the Ninth, which was no longer allowed to be performed in the German Reich; Swarowsky also allows Polish audiences to attend concerts; Swarowsky prints neutral programs without Nazi symbols

December: Julia Laszkyss parents and grandparents are sent from Vienna to a concentration camp near Krakow in 1944. Swarowsky knows about it and supports them with clothes and food for as long as possible; they are deported towards the end of the year and never return; the roots of the Kranz family in Poland and the deportation of the Laszky family are contributing to Swarowsky’s decision to stay in Krakow;

Goebbels sends a delegation to Krakow to immediately dismiss Swarowsky, on the grounds that he would be a 'friend of Poland ... and no longer acceptable', and the Gestapo collects intelligence about him; Franck enforces the remaining of Swarowsky one last time;

December 31: Franck orders a 'New Year's Eve Concert after Viennese model' (although the Soviet troops are within earshot of the city).

1945
The concerts were often visited by soldiers and had 'a very tragic undertone, thousands of soldiers listened to music for the last time in their lives. It has always been frightening when departing troops came to a concert in closed groups ... '(Swarowsky)

January 14: last concert in Krakow, after which instruments and sheet music archive were to be transported to the 'Reich'; Swarowsky, however, only packs old newspapers and dummies and thus made it possible for the Philharmonic Orchestrato live on after the war.

January 16: Swarowsky travels with the last train from Krakow to Vienna and forces the couple Pfitzner to join on the journey - on the 17th the Red Army occupies Krakow; Swarowsky and the Pfitzners find refuge in Vienna in the air-raid shelter of the Hotel Imperial

February 13: (Carnival Tuesday): Swarowsky is in Dresden on this day and survives the heaviest bombardment of Dresden, which almost completely destroyed the city;

March: 'I just went in the wrong direction, no one noticed it, as in Roda-Roda' - Swarowsky evades the convocation to the Volkssturm by desertion; probably with the help of Strauss, Swarowsky, who had been under surveillance for some time by the Gestapo, hides in the vacant Villa Ostini in Pöcking am Starhemberg; he spends the months with his wife Maria in the attic of the house until the end of the war; as a 'survival training' he memorizes the Brockhaus encyclopaedia

Beginning of May: Son Anton, as US NCO, tracks down his father in Pöcking and 'liberates' him; the unusual incident is reported in US newspapers; then father and son Swarowsky drive to Garmisch with an US escort to 'protect' Strauss

April: Strauss addresses his 'Artistic Legacy' to Dr. Ing. K. Böhm and in a duplicate to Swarowsky

July 20: Swarowsky's appointment as GMD of the Stuttgart Opera House, where Albert Kehm is again director; Swarowsky meets in Stuttgart Karin Schlemmer, the daughter of Oskar Schlemmer, they fall in love and want to marry - reason for Swarowsky’s wife Maria to file for divorce

December: Swarowsky is 'gray acceptable' for the US military government and banned from conducting, as he has not yet been 'denazified'; at his request, he undergoes an intensive psychological denazification test by the US authorities in Bad Orb

December 19: after reviewing the statements (especially regarding Swarowsky's activities in the resistance and for the Allies) he was put on the 'White List' as blameless and was allowed to conduct again; nevertheless, Swarowsky leaves Stuttgart and goes to Vienna.

1946
From the middle of the year onwards, Swarowsky makes a comeback like no other: Vienna State Opera, Vienna Symphony Orchestra, radio broadcasts, Bregenz Festival, Salzburg Festival

June 20: great success with the first concert as new chief conductor of the Vienna Symphony Orchestra in the Vienna Musikverein; it is noticeable that the US authorities are always supporting Swarowsky; nevertheless, the post-war situation hits him hard: without any noteworthy income, meals in a soup kitchen near the Volksoper - but without Anton's care packages it would have been even worse; the young Doris Kreuz sits on a podium seat not unnoticed by the eyes of the conductor

June 30: debut at the Vienna State Opera (Bohème)

August 5: opening of the first Bregenz Festival Week with Bastien and Bastienne for the first time on an improvised lake stage with barges

August 8 and 9: concerts with the Vienna  Symphony Orchestra; the success of Swarowsky's performances (including Eroica) contributes essentially to the founding of the Bregenz Festival and the permanent participation of the Vienna Symphony Orchestra

August 6: opening of the first Salzburg Festival after the end of the war, Swarowsky conducts the Rosenkavalier (at the express wish of Dr. Lothar, the US Commissioner for Culture), directed by Oskar Wälterlin, whom he knew from Zurich;  the director was based at the Schauspielhaus, leading the most important German-speaking exile stage: what was forbidden in the German Reich, got performed there. The rehearsals were hampered by heckling: individual orchestra members of the Vienna  Philharmonic Orchestra (40% were NSDAP members) rudely accused Swarowsky for his cooperation with the Allies, as traitor and even ‘Franck-Murderer'; Karajan (still banned from conducting) played the role of 'prevented master of the house' behind the scenes  (Clemens Krauss),  interfering in rehearsals and acted unsollicited as prompter.

August 31: Swarowsky becomes Principal Conductor of the Vienna Symphony Orchestra: his goal is to turn the "Municipal Rent-Orchestra" into the leading concert orchestra in Vienna, one with an independent profile and at the level of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, whose domain was the opera: '... I can not help but think and plan to work with my whole mental capacity towards development.' Swarowsky's concerts are both in repertoire and interpretation  a ‘palace revolution’ versus traditional Vienna: it is about a (for the period) radical modern interpretation style and introducing new repertoire in contrast to traditional romanticizing performances; in his first season Swarowsky conducts about 100 concerts with the orchestra, part of it also for radio and tours through Austria;

September: Swarowsky takes over the conducting class at the Vienna Music Academy

September 6: Beginning of the first Vienna Season of the Vienna Symphony Orchestra; with the help of son Anton, Swarowsky organizes much needed string material and bow hair  for the orchestra from America (not available in Vienna);

September 12: Founding concert of the Austrian - Polish Society in Memory of the Liberation of Austria by J. Sobieski in 1685; Swarowsky conducts at the request of the Poles as a conductor in recognition of his stance in Krakow 1944

September 28: Festive Concert of the Austrian Government for the 950th anniversary of the name "Österreich" (Ostarrichi Certificate); on the program among others the "premiere" of the new Rosenkavalier suite by Strauss, dedicated to Swarowsky;

October 19: Swarowsky conducts for the first time Mahler: Des Knabe Wunderhorn Songs and the 1st movement of the 3rd Symphony

November 13: Swarowsky conducts Beethoven’s Eroica in Vienna - against the grain of the romanticized performance practice and polarizes the audiences; two conductors characterize the styles of interpretation: Furtwängler on the one hand, and on the othe, to which also belongs Swarowsky, Toscanini (and Krauss);

December 4: Swarowsky conducts The Song of the Earth (R. Anday, J. Patzak);

1947
Despite greatest successes with audiences, the press and professionals for the development of the orchestra, the contract with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra was surprisingly not extended – responsible were internal organizational problems of the orchestra, its financing, the return of conductors hitherto banned from conducting for whom dates were needed, and last but not least common Viennese intrigues. Swarowsky's high artistic demands on the orchestra also met with resistance from its works council; in May, Swarowsky writes: "... I'm a beaten man ... the loss of my career at an age when you know you can never catch up, that you do not have to kill yourself," He is particularly struck by the fact that his "mentor" Clemens Krauss secretly negotiated to take over the orchestra. At the same time, however, all existing aversions against Krauss in Vienna were also transferred to Swarowsky.

February 21: For the first time Mahler's Symphony No. 9 with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra

July 13 - 27: Swarowsky becomes the head of the "Ausseer Festwochen", a summer school of the Vienna Music Academy (now University of Music and Performing Arts) and other Austrian music schools with courses and numerous performances with the best students; Alfred Brendel, Paul Badura-Skoda, Leonie Rysanek, Walter Berry, Alexander Jenner, Zubin Mehta  perform regularly throghout the following years: Swarowsky leads these festive weeks until 1956; this project too is decisively promoted by the US occupation forces;

Divorce from Maria Gerlach, the second wife of Swarowsky; Karin Schlemmer also withdraws and no longer agrees to a marriage;

August: Bregenz Festival Weeks with Mozart's abduction on a floating stage and concerts: "... masterful and captivating, as experienced ... only with Clemens Krauss ..."

September: Radio Wien commits Swarowsky to regular live broadcasts with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra

September 1: Swarowsky becomes Principal Conductor and Director of the Graz Opera House: his goal is to develop the possibilities of a structurally large opera house artistically from a provincial to a modern top theater: in addition to the 'old ensemble', Swarowsky engages young, enhusiastic, outstanding singers (Otto Edelmann, Oscar Czerwenka), set designer (Nordegg and Neumann-Spallart), conducts a 'modern' repertoire of great operas (Strauss, Hindemith, Stravinsky) but also Boris Godunov, Ottelo and Turandot, directs, and introduces informative program notes, whose texts he writes many times himself;
financially, this commitment means a great descent compared to Vienna, Swarowsky lives (together with a new fiancee Doris Kreuz) under the most pressing financial conditions in unheated hotel rooms often with only one meal per day; he still has to support his mother and his second wife Maria; Swarowsky also suffers again from health problems: he’s an insomniac for life;

September 17: first premiere at the Graz Opera House (Otello); followed by the Magic Flute (director: Swarowsky), Tosca (Swarowsky chooses original Roman theaters as a backdrop for the sets), Tannhäuser, and Cavalleria / Bajazzo;

September 20: civil marriage with Doris Kreuz (15. 2. 1930 - 1. 3. 2006) in Graz; Groomsmen: Karl Böhm and Wolfgng Schneiderhan; the marriage of the 47-year-old opera director to the 17-year-old does not go down well in arch-conservative Graz;

November 3: first performance in Graz of The song of the Earth (Patzak, Prunk)  -  reason enough for the audiences to still protest against Mahler

1948
July 5: Opening night of Ariadne auf Naxos at the "Graz Festival", which Swarowsky launches and whose public financing he enforces; his original plan of Wozzeck fails due to backward conditions

July 15: Ausseer Festwochen; in autumn he has to give up the Vienna conductor class for lack of time

September: Swarowsky takes four of his best students at the Vienna Music Academy to Graz, where they continue to learn in practice: among them Miltiades Caridis, Rudolf Bibl and Günther von Noe - all of them rehearse on the piano and conduct for Swarowsky

November 21: opening night of Meistersinger

1949
January 25: new productions of Turandot, followed by Fidelio, Troubadour, Boris Godunov and Cardillac

July 12: Grazer Festwochen with Salome as Swarowsky’s last premiere  with L. Welitsch, H. Töpper, J. Witt, O. Czerwenka. Swarowsky's time as a director ends earlier than planned, due to the consequences of wanting to renew Graz’s music life from scratch: resistance and intrigue against his initiatives at the opera, 'old' versus 'new' ensemble, overload of the orchestra, the old subscribers rage and stay away, young audiences are enthusiastic, the national socialistic residue is still strongly felt in Graz; Swarowsky conducts only once more in Graz, a concert in 1974.

All hopeful possibilities, which have arisen since 1945, seem to be shattered, even euphoric reactions from all sides do nothing against the return of the "old guard" and the return of former partisans of the NSDAP in important positions. Added to this are opposition to his musical views by orchestra and audiences: loss of the chief position of Vienna Symphony Orchestra, the Salzburg and Bregenz Festival, no engagement at the Vienna State Opera, early end of the directorship in Graz; Swarowsky remains professor at the Vienna Music Academy and conducts a few concerts with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, many of them school concerts, which he presumably set up, but which do not bring much financially; all this plunges Swarowsky into a veritable existential crisis with depressive moods, financial and health problems; Swarowsky is not an isolated case in a generation of victims of the Nazi regime injured substancially twice: during the Nazi era by the regime and then no less by its aftermath.

September: Swarowsky takes over the conducting class again at the Vienna Academy and teaches there de facto until his death in 1975; in the first years Karajan, Furtwängler, Jochum and above all Krauss are invited to guest seminars

October 9: Swarowsky begins a cycle of all 9 Mahler's symphonies in one season for the Ravag; These Sunday morning concert broadcasts offer many listeners the opportunity to hear all the symphonies for the first time

1950

Swarowsky meets O.E. Deutsch and H. C. Robbins Landon, the latter came to Vienna as a US soldier and organised a busy record production for the 'Boston Handel & Haydn Society' with Swarowsky as conductor , using US funding; a lifelong friendship develps, they discover among others  missing manuscript parts of Haydns last opera Orfeo in an antiquarian bookshop in northern Italy and work together on volumes of the New Mozart Complete Edition; at the latest with this year beginning of an extensive (but poorly paid) recording activity: Don Giovanni (for the first time unabridged and in Italian), for the first time a complete opera by Haydn -  L'animo del filosofo (Orfeo ed Euridice) - and later Handel's Giulio Cesare (the first complete, unabridged and Italian sung Handel opera on LP) with the ensemble of Vienna State Opera and the Vienna Symphony Orchestra

1951
May: Start of a new collaboration between the American-supported radio station in Vienna ("Rot – Weiss - Rot"): Swarowsky regularly conducts concerts of the Vienna Symphony Orchestra and arranges series of broadcasts which he also moderates

1952
January: Swarowsky conducts for the first time concerts for pupils and adolescents (Vienna Symphony Orchestra); this was a concern to him and he continues this to his last year in numerous concerts, which he also moderatea; thousands of Viennese secondary school children have heard these concerts and it corresponds to Swarovski's educational vein; these concerts are organized by the municipality of Vienna

July 12: first 'Arcade Court Concert' with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra:
open air summer concerts in the arcade court of the Vienna Town Hall organized by the municipality of Vienna; debut in Rio di Janeiro (Bruckner's Ninth Symphony), where Swarowsky will return regularly; Nikolaus Harnoncourt becomes (until 1969) a cellist with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra whose most frequent conductor is Swarowsky; around the rehearsals, intensive conversations develop between the two, which have a natural and lasting impact on Harnoncourt's understanding of music

1953
January 15: Swarowsky conducts his first concert with the Scottish National Symphony Orchestra, with whom he develops a long and close relationship

February: Swarowsky initiates the establishment of a "style commission" at the Vienna Music Academy, which is to deal with "stylistic questions and their musicological and pedagogical  evaluation for the academy", also planning research and publications  - an early attempt to iniate "historical performance practice"; Members of the commission are, apart from Swarowsky: J. Mertin, A. Heiller, A. Uhl, L. Wlach (Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra), F. Eibner, G. Leonhardt, J. Dichler; Swarowsky ends his involvement in 1961, as no concrete results are achieved;

Swarowsky sets up  the 'Academy Orchestra' of the Vienna Music Academy, which later becomes the Haydn Orchestra, whose excellent quality allowed concerts, tours and recordings; this orchestra was later also engaged for Swarowsky's international conducting courses (Bruxelles, Nice)

Swarowsky draws on his opera translations, some of which were written in the 1930s, revises them and has them published in the following year by the publishers Bärenreiter and Ricordi in piano reductions: Poppea (Monteverdi), Il mondo della luna (Haydn) , Il re pastore (Gluck), Orpheus and Euridice (Gluck), Simone Boccanegra, Falstaff and Don Carlos (Verdi) and La Bohème (Puccini); these translations dominate the German-speaking opera houses for the next decades and singers such as Otto Edelmann said 'they are in some ways more singable than the original'.

1954
January 11 - 28: a first larger series of concerts with the Scottish National Orchestra

May: Clemens Krauss dies unexpected, Swarowsky is very affected: it was a " love-hate" relationship with the man who enabled him on the one hand the survival in the Third Reich, but at the same time deliberately did not promote his conducting career; the general unpopularity of Krauss was also transferred to Swarowsky, who was considered his "right hand man"

1955
'Gib mir die Hand, mein Leben' Mozart film with Oskar Werner: Swarowsky conceives the music and conducts orchestra and soloists of the Vienna State Opera. The producer is Carl Szokoll, an (Austrian) major of the German Wehrmacht, who successfully organized the July coup against Hitler in Vienna in 1944 and was the only one of the masterminds remaining undiscovered; he saved Vienna from planned destruction in 1945 by boycotting the plans of the Wehrmacht and making contact with Soviet Generals;

November 4: second major concert series with the Scottish National Orchestra;
Swarowsky realises a recording project with an American label. He intends to record all Beethoven symphonies 'for the first time in the required and authentic manner, including the original metronomes'; symphonies 2 to 8 will be recorded;

1956
March 13: first concert with the  London Philharmonic Orchestra: in the next few years he will conduct London orchestras regularly as well as in Covent Garden

October 1: Swarowsky conducts in the presence of the composer the first public performance of Stravinsky's Canticum Sacrum at La Scala in Milan (after a first performance by the composer in St. Marks Cathedral in Venice)

1957
From 1954 and 1955 onwards, Swarowsky's activity as conductor starts again developing again, 1957 is a turning point: from now on until his death, an international career should finally unfold without further interruption; Mahler being the central repertoire; it is the contract with the Vienna State Opera and increasingly frequent international tours and high-profile recordings that shape Swarovskys activity henceforth; Swarowsky's diary is literally "booked out"

January 11: first concert as Principal Conductor of the Scottish National Orchestra in Edinburgh (succeeding Karl Rankl); until November 22, 1959, he spends almost half of the year in Scotland and London;

May 23: Swarowsky’s performance of  Mahler's 3rd Symphony with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra (which has not been played since 1946) finally make a breakthrough with two performances in the Wr. Konzerthaus (but in the Mozartsaal - apparently only a small audience was expected!); From this concert on, Swrowsky conducts almost every year at least one Mahler work in Vienna with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra and many abroad, among others. with the Covent Garden Orchestra, Dresdner Philharmonic Orchestra, Gewandhausorchestra Leipzig, Israel Philharmonic  Orchestra, London Philharmonic Orchestar, Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra, N.Ö. Tonkünstlerorchestra, Grazer Städtisches Orchestra, Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal, Staatskapelle Dresden, RSO Berlin, Scottish National Orchestra, Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, Hungarian National Philharmonic, Württembergisches State Orchestra;
In total, Swarowsky conducts Mahler works some 120 times, an achievement rarely matched by anyone;

1958
Swarowsky's first international masterclass at the Bruxelles World Expo provides an international echo of his teaching; The three-week course takes place in the Austria Pavilion, todays "20er-Haus" in Vienna; a quasi public course, by passing audiences could see through the glass walls from the outside;

since the beginning of his activity in 1946, numerous conductors, musicians, composers and other music professionals study with Swarowsky either at the Music Academy, at courses or privately; his international reputation is set in 1958 with C. Abbado and Z. Mehta, from then on more  and more internationally successful conductors, repetieurs and other music professionals leave his class, many of them working at the Vienna State Opera: P. Angerer (1947), M. Caridis (1947), R. Bibl (1948), H. Goertz (1948), D. Dixon (1949), G. Leonhardt (1950), H. Deutsch (1951), A. Vandernoot (1953), A. Logothetis (1953), K. Floros (1954), M. Argerich (1956),  B. Klobucar (1956), R. Brock (1957), P. Schneider (1959), F. Pleyer (1959), Th. Guschlbauer (1959), R. Hoszfeld (1961), E. Dunshirn (1963), R. Weikert (1963), P. Schrottner (1964), D. Kitaenko (1967), L. Zagrosek (1967), J. Lopez-Cobos (1969), M. Jansons (1970), A. Fischer (1971), J. Delacote (1971), M. Gomez-Martinez (1971), W. Blovsky (1971), B. Weil (1972), E. Binder (1972), G. Sinopoli (1973), St. Soltész (1973), I. Fischer (1974), M. Huss (1975) A. Eschwe (1975).

Honorary membership of the International Gustav Mahler Society Vienna

1959
December 22: Karajan hires Swarowsky to the State Opera; Don Carlos becomes a big hit as a debut; Swarowsky will conduct  some 200 evenings at the State Opera until 1975; his repertoire focuses on Mozart, Strauss, Verdi and Puccini, Monteverdi's Poppea more than 12 times (after Karajan no longer wants to conduct this production);

1960

After the end of the Scottish contract Swarowsky doesn’t take on any other position as chief conductor, his living conditions have changed and after the birth of daughter Daniela he avoids longer stretches of absence; he is now firmly rooted in Vienna: up to 30 evenings per year at the State Opera, numerous concerts and recordings with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra and the other Vienna orchestras, professor at the Academy of Music, frequent guest tours especially to Italy, Germany, England, but also Rio di Janeiro and North America, the summer conducting courses - there were no free dates; sny position would have meant to give up a substantial part of these engagements and not be in Vienna for many months - that's not what Swarowsky wants; however, he performs regularly with nearly three dozen of the best orchestras in the world for the rest of his life;

February 2: Mahler's 100th birthday - Swarowsky conducts again the third symphony (Vienna Symphony Orchestra) and meets again Alma Mahler, whom he knowns since the 1920s from his sister Ginas literary salons;

March 23: Swarowsky conducts the first adaptation of an opera for television by the ORF (Austrian Broadcasting Corporation) with the Vienna State Opera Orchestra: Salome (Hotter, Patzak, Maria Kouba)

July 15: birth of daughter Daniela

July 15 - August 6: Swarowsky heads the conducting course of the Académie d'eté in Nice (founded by F, Oubradous and J. Cocteau) until 1966; in addition to the course there are also concerts and opera performances in the Cimiez Monastery, which are partly conducted by Swarowsky, partly by students;
Debut with the RSO Cologne (Symphony Orchestra of the WDR) with D. Mitropolous as chief conductor: in the following years Swarowsky conducts numerous studio productions (including Strauss, Stravinsky, Schönberg, Beethoven) and concerts;

1963
November 23: debut concert with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, replacing the ill Paul Hindemith;

1964
February: debut with the Los Angeles Philharmonic with Mahler's 3rd Symphony resulting in annual returns

April 15: In the evening, following a rehearsal for Schoenberg's Gurre Lieder, admission to the Berlin Masonic Lodge "To the Three Seraphim", later also to the 'Loge Mozart' in Vienna (which was still in the same house as Mozart was at the time), Swarowsky also visits lodges in London, Italy and achieves as 4th Master degree

April 17: Schoenberg's Gurre Lieder in Berlin (Lipp, Lilowa, Schachtschneider, Heltau); increasingly, Swarowsky conducts works of the 2nd Wr. School, especially by Schoenberg, whose orchestral works are almost completely in his repertoire

March: Cologne opera: Ariadne auf Naxos and studio productions for the WDR with a larger series of works by R. Srauss on his 100th birthday, he also speaks on WDR radio broadcasts himself; Strauss is the most conducted composer in Swarowsky's career, with more than 250 performances both in opera and concert

May 15: Performance of Bruckner's 9th Symphony with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra at the Stifskirche St. Florian; Bruckner counts alongside Mahler, R. Strauss, Brahms, Beethoven and works of the 20th century to the core Swarowsky's repertoire, he conducts his symphonies about 100 times, alone the ninth 25 times;

1965
A typical season for Swarowsky: two trips to Los Angeles, Montréal (Brucker III and Kindertotenlieder), Covent Garden London, Budapest (Mahler III.), Tonkünstlerorchester, Vienna Symphony and Philharmonic Orchestra concerts in Vienna, State Opera (Don Carlos, Poppea), Berlin (Schoenberg Pelleas), Hamburg, Dortmund, Cologne, Stuttgart (Song of the Earth as ballet) recordings in Vienna (Schütz Christmas story);

The most frequent soloists in Swarowsky's concerts were among others Accardo, Argerich, Arrau, Bachauer, Badura-Skoda, Backhaus, Benedetti-Michelangelo Casadesus, Cherkassky, Curzon, V. de los Angeles, Forrester, Francescatti, Gendron, Gilels, F. Gulda, Horszowsky, Menuhin, Moiseiwitsch, Novaes, Ursuleac , Kempff, Kiepura, H. Konetzni, Tortelier, Stich-Randall, Seefried, Wunderlich, Sciutti, D. Oistrakh, Prey, Popp, Peerce, Rostropovich, Rostal, Ricci, Reynolds, Rampal, Wolfg. Schneiderhan, Weissenberg

1967
July: first conducting course in Orkney Springs Virginia (USA) - hosted by the League of American Orchestras

July - August: Swarowsky records the entire ring for the Westminster label in Nuremberg in only four weeks with the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra. The orchestra was allowed international travels during the short period of the ‘Praque Spring’; it is the second studio production ever (after Solti) and is counted among the best by many reviewers (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung) and others); some of the singers were big names from Eastern countries: Otto v. Rohr (Wotan) and Nadezda Kniplova (Brünhilde); the horn solos were played by the legendary Viennese hornist Robert Freund:

September: studio production of Bach's St. Matthew Passion for the first time with a small orchestra and choir based on the principles of historically informed performance practice , Josef Mertin contributes a specially reconstructed organ positive; for the participating musicians and singers (also Kurt Equiluz) the recording becomes a formative experience; in the following year, the Christmas Oratorio is recorded as well

1968
October: four-week conducting course in Rio di Janeiro, organized by the Brazilian Ministry of Culture and Broadcasting;

Mozart Medal of the Mozartgemeinde Wien;

With the help of one of his students, who obtains a study grant in Moscow, Swarowsky manages to find his sister Joska through the Red Cross – subsequently she comes twice to Vienna and meets for the first time in 45 years her nearly 90 years old mother Leopoldine; 

1969
April 10: beginning of a long-term recording series of studio productions of Mahler's symphonies (5,6,7 and 9) with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra and the ORF

May 23: birth of daughter Gloria during the dress rehearsal of Beethoven's Missa Solemnis conducted by L. Bernstein in Vienna, where Hans Swarowsky was present; Bernstein suggests the name Gloria;

June 17: Vienna Festival at the Konzerthaus: Works by Schoenberg, including the Vienna premiere of the second act of Moses and Aron; the concert will be canceled after the rehearsal as only 36 (!) tickets were sold ...

Swarowsky's second recording of Don Giovanni with the Prague Chamber Orchestra and a purely Italian ensemble of singers;

1970
March: Swarowsky conducts 16 concerts with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, including Mahler's Ninth Symphony; as a special award he receives from Prime Minister Golda Meir two shekel coins from the time of Christ, which he carries henceforth as cufflinks during his performances; immediately after returning to Vienna surgery caused by his severe cancer;

October 2: new production of the Vienna State Opera in the Redoutensaal of the Imperial castle: Milhaud Le pauvre matelot, Ravel L'heure espangole, Ibert Angélique, Director: Axel Corti;

Swarowsky designes and takes over the direction of the studio for young singers at the Vienna State Opera (where, among others, Edita Gruberova began her career and rehearsed her first major roles such as Zerbinetta, Queen of the Night and Konstanze);

1971
July 25 - August 15: first conducting course at the Carinthian Summer Ossiach, founded and directed by H. Wobisch, board member of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra; Swarowsky conducts this three-week course annually until 1974, with around 70 students from around the world each year; parallely there are also courses held by K. Penderecki, H. Haselböck and H. Szering;

1972
January 16: the ORF broadcasts the first episode of a new series designed by Swarowsky:  'Lebendige Musik', which aims to bring music to a broader audience; Swarowsky conducts and explains.

1973
February 22: Swarowsky conducts Turandot at the Vienna State Staatsoper - during the second act he collapses unconscious and is rushed to Viennas AKH hospital for an emergency brain tumor surgery – he rerturns to the pit of the Vienna State Opera after only three months with Don Giovanni;

Swarowsky records Lohengrin and Brahms symphonies in Nuremberg; last recording of Brahms' choral  works with orchestra in Bratislava and Mahlers fourth symphony in Praque; a planned complete recording of the symponies remains unfinished;

October 11: Swarowsky conducts a tour of the NHK Symphony Orchestra in Japan

1974
April 25: performance of Mahler’s Symphony No. 7 at the Vienna Konzerthaus with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra; on this occasion award of the "Golden Mahler Medal" of the International Mahler Society by Gottfried von Einem; the highest honors follow: Honorary ring of the City of Vienna; Austrian State Award for Science and Art (dating back to the Monarchy, it can only be awarded to a maximum of 36 living personalities)

September 15: Swarowsky conducts at the Vienna State Opera a festival performance on his 75th birthday: Fidelio (Nilsson, Ridderbusch); since 1959 Swarowsky has conducted 180 performances at the Vienna State Opera with the best singers: Adam, Auger, Baltsa, Berry, Boesch, Capucilli, Dermota, Domingo, Edelmann, Felbermayer, Frick, Ghiaurov, Goltz, Grist, Güden, Hesse, Janowitz, Jones, Jurinac, Kmentt, Kunz, Lipp, Patzk, Price L., Resnik, Schwarzkopf, Siepi, Sotin, Zadek, Zampieri, etc.

November 20: Swarowsky conducts Mahler's Sixth Symphony in Budapest with the Hungarian National Philharmonic Orchestra as his last Mahler performance

1975
Last performances: at the Vienna State Opera Bajazzo / Cavalleria and Magic Flute (January 30 - 31) ;Vienna Symphony Orchestra: R. Strauss Macbeth, Beethoven VIII., Villa-Lobos Piano Concerto/Wührer (March 16); Hofmusikkapelle (Hofburgkapelle) Mozart Organ Solo Mass (May 11, last performance in Vienna);

June:  4 week tour to Argentina with several concerts and a several week long conducting course; Swarowsky conducts his last concert at the Teatro Colon on June 19, 1975: Mozarts Jupiter Symphony and Brahms second symphony;

July: last conducting course in Vienna; Swarosky is admitted to hospital on the last day of the course, his cancer has become incurable;

September 10: Hans Swarowsky dies in Salzburg and is buried in a grave of honor at the Vienna Central Cemetery near Schoenberg's grave.

October 5: The Vienna Philharmonic dedicates its first subscription concert of the season 1975/76 under the direction of Claudio Abbado "in memoriam Hans Swarowsky", a recording is released Deutsche Grammophon (Mozart: Maurerische Trauermusik, grave music KV 42 and ‘Waisenhausmesse’ K 139).

© Hans Swarowsky Akademie