Enantiomerically pure (S)-alpha-damascone (1) was synthesized from (R)-2,4,4-trimethyl-2-cyclohexen-1-ol (2) by employing two different sigmatropic rearrangement reactions to transfer the chirality at C-1 of 2 to C-3. The starting material 2 could be prepared by either enzymatic asymmetric hydrolysis of (+/-)-3 or chemical asymmetric reduction of 4.