undergoing surgery in 1977 and again in 1978, and had initially avoided the implications of her failing health for her late husband's artistic legacy. However, by the later summer of 1980 she had been persuaded to give the matter serious consideration, and on 25 September a board of six trustees was elected for the newly established "Kurt Weill Foundation". The six included Kim Kowalke, today (2017) the foundation's long-standing president and, Lys Symonette who for a quarter of a century, till her death would serve as the foundation's vice-president. When Lenya died the foundation's mandate to "administer, promote, and perpetuate "the legacies of Kurt Weill and Lotte Lenya" was confirmed in her will. Lys Symonette suffered a fatal heart attack at Windsor, New York less than a month before what would have been her ninety-first birthday. References Sources Musicians from Mainz German editors German women editors German pianists German women pianists Jewish emigrants from Nazi Germany to the United States 1914 births 2005 deaths 20th-century German women