The family of Ján Albrecht had broadly branched roots on the side of both Alexander Albrecht’s father and Margaret Albrecht’s mother, born Fischer.
Alexander’s father Johannes Albrecht (1852-1926), a cultured and well-educated person, was a teacher at the Catholic Grammar School in Pressburg (located in the building of the former Poor Clares Monastery – nowadays the University Library building), then the director of the State Grammar School (the building of today’s Music Academy on Zochova Street), later the chief inspector and custodian of the Pressburg Municipal Museum. Alexander’s mother Maria (Mariska) Albrecht, b. Vaszary (1864-1913), was the niece of the Hungarian primate and cardinal Kolos Vaszary. The artistic inclinations of the Vaszary family are documented by occupations of her closest relatives – her cousin János Vaszary (1867-1938) belonged to important painters, her nephew Gábor Vaszary (1897-1985) was a writer and screenwriter, her niece Piri Vaszary (1901-1965) was an actress.
Thomas Messer, the son of Alexander’s sister Agatha, was also an exceptional figure from the Albrecht family. The vicissitudes of World War II took him to the United States, where, as a graduate of the Paris Sorbonne, he gradually became director of the Roswell Museum in New Mexico, head of the American Art Association, director of the Boston Institute of Contemporary Art, and eventually headed the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York.
The origin of Alexander’s wife Margaréta Fischer (1887-1985) gives an opportunity to look into the genealogy of several important Pressburg bourgeois families – the Fischer, Fröhlich, Jurenák, and Lehner families. Johann Fischer, the eldest, a member of the Pressburg Town Council and Advisor of the Chamber, was promoted to an aristocratic status by Emperor Francis II for his contribution to the development of trade in 1832. In 1825, together with the doctor Michael Schönbauer, he founded a champagne factory in Pressburg according to the original French recipe, with which he won a bronze medal at the World’s Fair in Paris in 1867! Thus, the factory founder was not Johann Evangelist Hubert, as until recently assumed. He bought the factory from Johann Fischer only in 1877. Two generations of the Fischer family, Johann the oldest and Johann the younger, who was the grandfather of Margaret Fischer, belonged to the wealthiest, but at the same time socially engaged families of the city. They held senior positions in the nascent banking industry, in the Chamber of Industry and Commerce, but also in charity and funding associations. Margaret’s father – Johann the youngest (1841-1911) served in the Habsburg Imperial and Royal Army, for which he was awarded a silver commemorative medal. By civilian occupation, he was a freight forwarder of the Royal Hungarian State Railway.
Margareta Albrecht’s mother came from the Jurenák family. They settled in Pressburg before 1803 and although they did not initially belong to wealthy families, their timber trade was obviously successful. This is evidenced by the portraits of Adam and Ludmila Jurenák, painted by the famous Austrian painter Johann Peter Kraft in 1810. Ordering such works from a member of the Vienna Academy and a professor of historical painting was certainly not cheap. The Jurenák extended family was characterized by courage and a desire for education and social involvement – Jozef Jurenák (1809-1857) studied pharmacy in Paris, and traveled through Europe, especially through Great Britain. Margaret’s grandfather Anton Jurenák (1813-1896) completed business trips to Germany, France, England, Holland, Belgium, Prussia, Switzerland, Italy, Greece, Turkey, and Russia. In the 1880th he is listed in the directories as the owner of the house on Gröslingova no. 4, which is the back entrance to the Jurenák Palace (today’s seat of the Bratislava – Old Town Local Authority). As a representative of The First Danube Steamship Company used (as a first in history) a steamer constructed in England for Danube shipping. His younger brother Karol greatly admired Richard Wagner, he corresponded with Robert Volkmann (1815-1885), who dedicated the 3rd Serenade for String Orchestra to him, befriended Johannes Brahms, who was a guest at the Jurenák Palace, where family concerts were held.
Margaret Albrecht’s sister (Fischer) Gertrude married Gustav Lehner . Their son Eugen Lehner became a violist in the world-famous Kolisch Quartet, which premiered 3rd and 4th String Quartet by Arnold Schönberg, Alban Berg´s Lyrical Suite , Webern´s StringTrio and String Quartet same as 6th String Quartet by Béla Bartók. The Kolisch Quartet studied new works exclusively from scores, not from parts, played concerts by heart, and became one of the most dedicated promoters of new music in the third and fourth decade of 20th century. After fleeing Europe because of fascism, Eugen Lehner applied for a place in a viola group in the Boston Symphony Orchestra. When the chief conductor Serge Koussevitzky saw him in 1939 at the BSO, he took him on with no audition, he remembered him from the performance of Berg´s Lyrical Suite ten years ago in Wiesbaden, Germany. Lehner played at the BSO until 1982, working first simultaneously at the Stradivari Quartet, then at the Boston Fine Arts Quartet, and as a teacher at the New England Conservatory, he raised a number of world-class chamber musicians.
They were, finally, well-educated, sensitive, and cultured women Margaréta Albrecht (Fischer) and her sister Jeanny Fischer (1883-1970). Jeanny received a diploma from the Pressburg School of Teaching in 1902, she did not get married, she was a lifelong companion of the Albrecht family and lived with them in the same household, first on Lodná Street and later on Kapitulská no. 1 1. Alexander’s wife Margaret graduated from the Teacher´s Institute in 1910, before 1905 she received a diploma as a teacher for primary schools, later she became a student at the Faculty of Philosophy of the Hungarian Royal Academy in Budapest and at the Elizabethan University in Pressburg In 1909 and 1910 she attended French courses in Geneva and Paris. She married Alexander Albrecht on 28th of April 1918. Despite her excellent education and qualifications, she taught for the rest of her life at the lowest level of education – at the German Primary School on Zochova Street, in Pressburg.
(Elaborated and based on studies by Zuzana Francová issued at the Museum of the City of Bratislava)
