Heinz Holliger presented with the Alban Berg ring

Friedrich Cerha, the previous holder of the ring, died in February 2023.

On May 15, 2024, Heinz Holliger became the new holder of the Alban Berg ring. After Friedrich Cerha's death in February 2023, the envelope he kept in the safe of the Alban Berg Foundation was opened. In the envelope, Cerha named Heinz Holliger as the next holder of the ring. Cerha explains, “There is no one living who is comparable to the ring's namesake, but the man I have nominated has a combination of qualities that make him worthy of this honor as a composer who deserves to be taken seriously and as a very committed performing musician.”

Heinz Holliger was born in Langenthal, Switzerland, in 1939 and began taking music lessons at an early age. He wrote his first compositions at the age of fourteen. In 1956, he began studying at the Bern Conservatory with Emile Cassagnaud (oboe) and Sándor Veress (composition). After graduating from high school two years later, he also obtained a teaching diploma and studied piano at the Bern Conservatory. From 1961 to 1963, he also took further composition lessons with Pierre Boulez. In 1959, he began his professional career as solo oboist with the Basel Orchestra Society. His first recordings and worldwide appearances followed in 1961. In 1965, he accepted a professorship at the University of Music in Freiburg im Breisgau. From 1975, he was a permanent guest conductor with Paul Sacher's Basel Chamber Orchestra. From 1998 to 2001, he was also conductor of the Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne. He was composer-in-residence at the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande (1993/1994), at the Lucerne Festival (1998) and at the Sommerliche Musiktage Hitzacker (2002). In 2007, the Rheingau Music Festival's composer portrait was dedicated to Holliger. In 1987 he founded the Basel Music Forum together with Jürg Wyttenbach and Rudolf Kelterborn. Holliger has composed numerous stage works, orchestral, solo and chamber music works.

The Alban Berg Ring is awarded by the Alban Berg Foundation. It is awarded to “persons who have made outstanding contributions to the development, publication and cultivation of Alban Berg's works and their commemoration, to music composition and the development of the science and art of music, to music performance and music education, or to the advancement of music today and in Alban Berg's time through extraordinary achievement.” The Alban Berg ring bears his sheet music.