Alban Berg's widow kept the third act of Lulu unfinished for 41 years, and a composer finished it in secret for the publisher

Alban Berg died on 24 December 1935 with the opera Lulu orchestrated through two acts. Act 3 existed in short score. Universal Edition, his publisher, asked Schoenberg, Webern and Zemlinsky to finish it, and all declined. After the Zurich premiere of the two-act version on 2 June 1937, Berg's widow, Helene, declared the work complete and refused every attempt to finish act 3. In 1966 supporters of completion founded the International Alban Berg Society in New York. Helene answered by founding the Alban Berg Foundation in Vienna, committed to the short version, with the right to preside over it, choose its board and veto its decisions. Universal Edition commissioned the composer Friedrich Cerha in secret to orchestrate act 3. He began in 1962 and finished in 1974. Helene died in 1976, and one account says her will tried to extend the ban^†. Cerha revised the score in 1976 to 1977 and 1981. The three-act Lulu premiered at the Paris Opera on 24 February 1979, conducted by Pierre Boulez, 44 years after Berg's death. Cerha's version is now the standard three-act edition.