Vienna’s Central Cemetery, “developed a system of Ehrengräber, graves of honor,” with Beethoven, Schubert, Brahms, Salieri, and Schoenberg among those buried there, writes Sami Emory in Sunday’s (4/21) New York Times. “When Nariyasu Mishima, 64, a former funeral director from Osaka, Japan, visited the cemetery, he was struck by a thought: How wonderful would it be to be buried alongside some of the greatest musical minds of all time? … Directly inside the cemetery’s second gate … Mr. Mishima has found a place to house the urns of music lovers….. Mr. Mishima would not disclose what he paid for the tomb. But under the terms of his purchase agreement, he was obligated by the Federal Monuments Authority Austria to renovate it…. Mr. Mishima’s idea… is that music lovers will ship their ashes, or part of their ashes, from their home countries to rest there…. So far, only a few of the spots in the World Music Fan tomb have been claimed…. Mr. Mishima … himself a musician … sold one of the urns to himself. ‘I saw the graves of Beethoven and Schubert, and felt in my heart how happy I would be if I could have eternal sleep with them,’ he said.”
Posted April 23, 2019
