“Wagner’s musician has found his Valkyrie,” headlined Match in September 1958. This deity with “long hair like Rhinegold,” it was Eliette Mouret, 23 years old, who conquered the heart of the most famous conductor, Herbert von Karajan, 51 years old . The Frenchwoman and the Austrian met for the first time in 1955 in the Bay of Canoubiers on a mutual friend’s yacht. According to legend, the young woman felt unwell at sea, and Karajan used his sea legs to bring her safely back to Saint-Tropez…
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A secret relationship
The affair is said to have taken place a few months later in London, where Karajan was the unofficial conductor of the famous Philharmonic Orchestra. Eliette was also traveling through the British capital on business: as a model discovered by Christian Dior, she had come to present her mentor’s haute couture collections… The romance between Herbert and Eliette remained secret for a long time: it was Karajan at the time married to his second wife Anita. The relationship was finally formalized in March 1958 during the conductor’s triumph at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées.
On the eve of his wedding in October 1958, Match found the couple in Savoie. Before their wedding, Herbert von Karajan and Eliette Mouret treated themselves to a vacation in the Vallée Blanche with hiking and skiing. Despite the collaboration with our reporter Gérard Géry, the date and location of the ceremony are kept secret: “We want,” she said, “to be alone that day.” Small problem, however, our magazine laughs: “Some papers were missing. They only thought about taking notes with them in their luggage”…
The marriage of Herbert von Karajan and Eliette Mouret lasted 31 years, until the conductor’s death in 1989.
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