Coordinates	37°46′45.48″N122°25′9.12″N
Art	Stadt
Image photo	Marktplatz Bayreuth.JPG
Wappen	Wappen von Bayreuth.svg
Lat deg	49 |lat_min 56 |lat_sec 53
Lon deg	11 |lon_min 34 |lon_sec 42
Bundesland	Bayern
Regierungsbezirk	Oberfranken
Landkreis	Kreisfreie Stadt
Höhe	340
Fläche	66.92
Gemeindeschlüssel	09462000
Einwohner	72576
Stand	2009
Plz	95401–95448
Vorwahl	0921, 09201, 09209
Kfz	BT
Website	www.bayreuth.de
Bürgermeister	Michael Hohl
Bürgermeistertitel	Oberbürgermeister
Partei	CSU }}

Bayreuth (; ; ) is a sizeable town in northern Bavaria, Germany, on the Red Main river in a valley between the Franconian Jura and the Fichtelgebirge Mountains. The town's roots date back to 1194 and it is nowadays the capital of Upper Franconia with a population of 72,576 (2009). It is world-famous for its annual Bayreuth Festival at which performances of operas by the 19th century German composer Richard Wagner are presented.

History

Middle Ages and Early Modern Period

The town is believed to have been founded by the Counts of Andechs probably around the mid-12th century, but was first mentioned in 1194 as ''Baierrute'' in a document by Bishop Otto II of Bamberg. The syllable ''-rute'' may mean ''Rodung'' or "clearing", whilst ''Baier-'' indicates immigrants from the Bavarian region.

Already documented earlier, were villages later merged into Bayreuth: Seulbitz (in 1035 as the royal Salian estate of Silewize in a document by Emperor Conrad II) and St. Johannis (possibly 1149 as ''Altentrebgast''). Even the district of Altstadt (formerly Altenstadt) west of the town centre must be older than the town of Bayreuth itself. Even older traces of human presence were found in the hamlets of Meyernberg: pieces of pottery and wooden crockery were dated to the 9th century based on their decoration.

While Bayreuth was previously (1199) referred to as a ''villa'' (village), the term ''civitas'' ("town") appeared for the first time in a document published in 1231. One can therefore assume that Bayreuth was awarded its town charter between 1200 and 1230. The town was ruled until 1248 by the counts of Andechs-Merania. After they died out in 1260 the burgraves of Nuremberg from the House of Hohenzollern took over the inheritance. Initially, however, their residence and the centre of the territory was the castle of Plassenburg in Kulmbach. The town of Bayreuth developed slowly and was affected time and again by disasters.

As early as 1361 Emperor Charles IV had conferred on Burgrave Frederick V the right to mint coins for the towns of Bayreuth and Kulmbach.

Bayreuth was first published on a map in 1421.

In February 1430, the Hussites devastated Bayreuth and the town hall and churches were razed. Matthäus Merian described this event in 1642 as follows:''"In 1430 the Hussites from Bohemia attacked / Culmbach and Barreut / and committed great acts of cruelty / like wild animals / against the common people / and certain individuals. / The priests / monks and nuns they either burnt at the stake / or took them onto the ice of lakes and rivers / (in Franconia and Bavaria) and doused them with cold water / and killed them in a deplorable way / as Boreck reported in the Bohemian Chronicle, page 450"''((Source: Frühwald (Hg.): ''Fränkische Städte und Burgen um 1650'' based on texts and engravings by Merian, Sennfeld 1991.)

By 1528, less than ten years after the start of the Reformation, the lords of the Frankish margrave territories switched to the Lutheran faith.

In 1605 a great fire, caused by negligence, destroyed 137 of the town's 251 houses. In 1620 plague broke out and, in 1621, there was another big fire in the town. The town also suffered during the Thirty Years War.

A turning point in the town's history came in 1603 when Margrave Christian, the son of the elector, John George of Brandenburg, moved the aristocratic residence from the castle of Plassenburg above Kulmbach to Bayreuth. The first Hohenzollern palace was built in 1440-1457 under Margrave John the Alchemist. It was the forerunner of today's Old Palace (''Altes Schloss'') and was expanded and renovated many times. The development of the new capital stagnated due to the Thirty Years' War, but afterwards many famous baroque buildings were added to the town. After Christian's death in 1655 his grandson, Christian Ernest, followed him, ruling from 1661 until 1712. He was an educated and well-travelled man, whose tutor had been the statesman Joachim Friedrich von Blumenthal. He founded the Christian-Ernestinum Grammar School and, in 1683, participated in the liberation of Vienna which had been besieged by the Turks. To commemorate this feat, he had the Margrave Fountain built as a monument on which he is depicted as the victor of the Turks; it now stands outside the New Palace (''Neues Schloss''). During this time, the outer ring of the town wall and the castle chapel (''Schlosskirche'') were built.

18th century

His successor, the Crown Prince and later Margrave, George William, began in 1701 to establish the then independent town of St. Georgen am See (today, the district of St. Georgen) with its castle, the so-called ''Ordensschloss'', a town hall, a prison and a small barracks. In 1705 he founded the Order of Sincerity (Ordre de la Sincérité), which was renamed in 1734 to the Order of the Red Eagle and had the monastery church built, which was completed in 1711. In 1716 a princely porcelain factory was established in St. Georgen.

The first 'castle' in the park of the Hermitage was built at this time by Margrave George William (1715–1719).

In 1721 the town council acquired the palace of Baroness Sponheim (today's Old Town Hall or ''Altes Rathaus'') as a replacement for the town hall built in 1440 in the middle of the market place and destroyed by fire.

In 1735 a nursing home, the so-called Gravenreuth Stift, was founded by a private foundation in St. Georgen. The cost of the building exceeded the funds of the foundation, but Margrave Frederick came to their aid.

Bayreuth experienced its Golden Age during the reign (1735–1763) of Margrave Frederick and Margravine Wilhelmina of Bayreuth, the favourite sister of Frederick the Great. During this time, under the direction of court architects, Joseph Saint-Pierre and Carl von Gontard, numerous courtly buildings and attractions were created: the Margravial Opera House with its richly furnished baroque theatre (1744–1748), the New 'Castle' and Sun Temple (1749–1753) at the Hermitage, the New Palace with its courtyard garden (1754 ff) to replace the Old Palace which had burned down through the carelessness of the margrave, and the magnificent row of buildings in today's ''Friedrichstraße''. There was even a unique version of the rococo architectural style, the so-called Bayreuth Rococo which characterised the aforementioned buildings, especially their interior design.

The old, sombre gatehouses were demolished because they impeded transport and were an outmoded form of defence. The walls were built over in places. Margrave Frederick successfully kept his principality out of the wars being waged by his brother-in-law, Frederick the Great, at this time, and, as a result, brought a time of peace to the Frankish kingdom.

1742 saw the founding of the Frederick Academy, which was became a university in 1743, but was moved that same year to Erlangen after serious riots because of the adverse reaction of the population. The university has remained there to the present today. From 1756 to 1763 there was also an Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Roman Catholics were given the right to set up a prayer room and Jewish families settled here again. In 1760 the synagogue was opened and in 1787 the Jewish cemetery was dedicated.

Countess Wilhelmina died in 1758 and, although, Margrave Frederick married again, the marriage was only short-lived and without issue. After his death in 1763, many artists and craftsmen migrated to Berlin and Potsdam, to work for King Frederick the Great, because Frederick's successor, Margrave Frederick Christian had little understanding of art. He also lacked the means due to the elaborate lifestyle of his predecessor, because the buildings and the salaries of the mainly foreign artists had swallowed up a lot of money. For example the court - which under George Frederick Charles had comprised around 140 people - had grown to about 600 employees by the end of the reign of Margrave Frederick. By 1769 the principality was close to bankruptcy.

In 1769 Margrave Charles Alexander, from the Ansbach line of Frankish Hohenzollerns, followed the childless Frederick Christian and Bayreuth was reduced to a secondary residence. Charles Alexander continued to live in Ansbach and rarely came to Bayreuth.

In 1775 the Brandenburg Pond (''Brandenburger Weiher'') in St.Georgen was drained.

Following the abdication of the last Margrave, Charles Alexander, from the principalities of Ansbach and Bayreuth on 2 December 1791 its territories became part of a Prussian province. The Prussian Minister Karl August von Hardenberg took over its administration at the beginning of 1792.

The town centre still possesses the typical structure of a Bavarian street market: the settlement is grouped around a road widening into a square; the Town Hall was located in the middle. The church stood apart from it and on a small hill stood the castle. Some sixty years later the town (at that time a tiny village) became subordinate to the Hohenzollern state, and when this state was divided, Bayreuth ended up in the county of Kulmbach.

19th century

In 1804, the author Jean Paul Richter moved from Coburg to Bayreuth, where he lived until his death in 1825.

The rule of the Hohenzollerns over the Principality of Kulmbach-Bayreuth ended in 1806 after the defeat of Prussia by Napoleonic France. During the French occupation from 1806 to 1810 Bayreuth was treated as a province of the French Empire and had to pay high war contributions. It was placed under the administration of Comte Camille de Tournon, who wrote a detailed inventory of the former Principality of Bayreuth. On 30 June 1810 the French army handed over the former principality to the what was now the Kingdom of Bavaria, which it had bought from Napoleon for 15 million francs. Bayreuth became the capital of the Bavarian district of Mainkreis, which later transferred into Obermainkreis and was finally renamed as the province of Upper Franconia.

As Bavaria was opened up by the railways, the main line from Nuremberg to Hof went past Bayreuth, running via Lichtenfels, Kulmbach and Neuenmarkt-Wirsberg to Hof. Bayreuth was first given a railway connexion in 1853, when the Bayreuth–Neuenmarkt-Wirsberg railway was built at the town's expense. It was followed in 1863 by the line to Weiden, in 1877 by the railway to Schnabelwaid, in 1896 by the branch line to Warmensteinach, in 1904 by the branch to Hollfeld and in 1909 by the branch via Thurnau to Kulmbach, known as the ''Thurnauer Bockala'' (which means something like "Thurnau Goat").

On 17 April 1870 Richard Wagner visited Bayreuth, because he had read about the Margrave Opera House, whose great stage seemed fitting for his works. However, the orchestra pit could not accommodate the large number of musicians required, for example, for the Ring of the Nibelung and the ambience of the auditorium seemed inappropriate for his piece, ''The Artwork of the Future'' (''Das Kunstwerk der Zukunft''). So, he toyed with the idea of building his own festival hall (the ''Festspielhaus'') in Bayreuth. The town supported him in this project and made a piece of land available to him, an undeveloped area outside the town between the railway station and Hohe Warte, the ''Grüner Hügel'' ("Green Hill"). At the same time Wagner acquired a property at ''Hofgarten'' to build his own house, ''Wahnfried''. On 22 May 1872 the cornerstone for the Festival Hall was laid and, on 13 August 1876, it was officially opened (see Bayreuth Festival). Planning and construction were in the hands of the Leipzig architect, Otto Brückwald, who had already made a name for himself in the building of theatres in Leipzig and Altenburg.

In 1886, the composer Franz Liszt died in Bayreuth while visiting his daughter Cosima Liszt, Wagner's widow. Both Liszt and Wagner are buried in Bayreuth; however Wagner did not die there. Rather he died in Venice in 1883, but his family had his body brought to Bayreuth for burial.

20th century

To the end of the Weimar Republic (1900–1933)

The new century also brought several innovations of modern technology: in 1892 the first electric street lights; in 1908 a municipal electricity station, and, in the same year, the first cinema.

In 1914-15, one section of the northern arm of the Red Main was straightened and widened after areas along the river had been flooded during a period of high water in 1909.

After the First World War had ended in 1918, the Workers' and Soldiers' Council took power briefly in Bayreuth. On 17 February 1919 there was a three-day coup, the so-called ''Speckputsch'', a brief interlude of excitement in the otherwise rather staid town.

In a series of ''völkisch'' and nationalist "Deutscher Tag" (German Days), the NSDAP organised the event in Bayreuth on September 30, 1923. More than 5.000 military and civilian people gathered (equivalent to 15% of the inhabitants), although Minister of Defence Otto Gessler had forbidden the participation of Reichswehr units. Among the guests were mayor Albert Preu as well as Siegfried and Winifred Wagner, who invitated keynote speaker Adolf Hitler to Wahnfried house. There he met writer Houston Stewart Chamberlain, son-in-law of Richard Wagner and anti-semitic race theorist. Also on that day, Hans Schemm met Hitler for the first time.

In 1932 the provinces of Upper and Middle Franconia were merged and Ansbach chosen as the seat of government. As a small compensation, Bayreuth was given the merged state insurance agency for Upper and Middle Franconia. Unlike the provincial merger, the merger of those institutions was never reversed.

The Nazi era (1933–1945)

Being a stronghold of right-wing parties since the 1920s, Bayreuth became a center of Nazi ideology. In 1933, it was made capital of the Nazi Gau of Bavarian Ostmark (''Bayerische Ostmark'', in 1943 ''Gau Bayreuth''). Nazi leaders often visited the Wagner festival and tried to turn Bayreuth into a Nazi model town. It was one of several places in which town planning was administered directly from Berlin, due to Hitler's special interest in the town and in the festival. Hitler loved the music of Richard Wagner, and he became a close friend of Winifred Wagner after she took over the festival. Hitler frequently attended Wagner performances in the Bayreuth Festival Hall.

Bayreuth was to have received a so-called ''Gauforum'', a combined government building and marching square built to symbolise the centre of power in the town. Bayreuth's first Gauleiter was Hans Schemm, who was also the head (''Reichswalter'') of the National Socialist Teachers League, NSLB, which was located in Bayreuth. In 1937 the town was connected to the new ''Reichsautobahn''.

Under Nazi dictatorship the synagogue of the Jewish Community in ''Münzgasse'' was desecrated and looted on Kristallnacht but, due to its proximity to the Opera House it was not razed. Inside the building, which is once again used by a Jewish community as a synagogue, a plaque next to the Torah Shrine recalls the persecution and murder of Jews in the Shoa, which at cost the lives of at least 145 Jews in Bayreuth.

During the Second World War a subcamp of the Flossenbürg concentration camp was based in the town, in which prisoners had to participate in physical experiments for the V2. Wieland Wagner, the grandson of the composer, Richard Wagner, was the deputy civilian director there from September 1944 to April 1945. Shortly before the war's end branches of the People's Court (''Volksgerichtshof'') were to have been set up in Bayreuth.

On 5, 8 and 11 April 1945 about one third of the town, including many public buildings and industrial installations were destroyed by heavy air strikes, along with 4,500 houses. 741 people were also killed. On 14 April, the U.S. Army occupied the town.

Post-war era and Reconstruction (1945–2000)

After the war Bayreuth tried to part with its ill-fated past. It became part of the American Zone. The American military government set up a DP camp to accommodate so-called displaced persons (DP). Most of them came from the Ukraine. The camp was supervised by the UNRRA.

The housing situation was very difficult at first: there were about 55,000 inhabitants in the town, many more than before the war began. This increase was primarily due to the high number of refugees and expellees. Even in 1948 more than 11,000 refugees were counted. In addition, because many homes had been destroyed due to the war, thousands of people were living in temporary shelters, even the festival restaurant next to the Festival Hall housed some 500 people.

In 1945, 1,400 men were conscripted by the town council for "essential work" (clean-up work on damaged buildings and the clearing of roads).

But cultural life was also soon back on track: in 1947 Mozart festival weeks were held in the Opera House, from which the Franconian Festival Weeks developed. In 1949 the Festival Hall was used for the first time again and there was a gala concert with the Vienna Philharmonic led by Hans Knappertsbusch. In 1951, the first post-war Richard Wagner Festival took place under the leadership of Wieland and Wolfgang Wagner.

In 1949 Bayreuth became the seat of the government of Upper Franconia again.

After the war a significant number of historic buildings were demolished.

In 1971 the Bavarian State Parliament decided to establish the University of Bayreuth and, on 3 November 1975, it opened for lectures and research. There are now about 10,000 students in the town.

In May 1972, a serious accident occurred at the folk festival in the town, when an overcrowded carriage derailed and several people were thrown out. Four died and five were injured, some seriously. At that time, it was the worst disaster on a roller coaster since the Second World War.

In 1999 the world gliding championship took place at Bayreuth municipal airport.

21st century

In 2006, Bayreuth chose its first CSU member and mayor, the lawyer, Michael Hohl, and, in 2007, a Youth Parliament, consisting of 12 young people, aged 14–17 years, was elected for the first time. The end of October saw the opening of the long-planned bus station and its associated office building on the newly created ''Hohenzollernplatz''.

Richard Wagner and Bayreuth

The town is best known for its association with the composer Richard Wagner, who lived in Bayreuth from 1872 until his death in 1883. Wagner's villa, "Wahnfried", was constructed in Bayreuth under the sponsorship of King Ludwig II of Bavaria, and was converted after World War II into a Wagner Museum. To the north of Bayreuth is the Festival Hall, an opera house specially constructed for and exclusively devoted to the performance of Wagner's operas. The premieres of the final two works of Wagner's ''Ring Cycle'' ("Siegfried" and "Götterdämmerung"); the cycle as a whole; and of ''Parsifal'' took place here.

Every summer, Wagner's operas are performed at the Festspielhaus during the month-long Richard Wagner Festival, commonly known as the Bayreuth Festival. The Festival draws thousands each year, and has persistently been sold out since its inauguration in 1876. Currently, waiting lists for tickets can stretch for 10 years or more.

Owing to Wagner's relationship with the then unknown philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, the first Bayreuth festival is cited as a key turning point in Nietzsche's philosophical development. Though at first an enthusiastic champion of Wagner's music, Nietzsche ultimately became hostile, viewing the festival and its revellers as symptom of cultural decay and bourgeois decadence —an event which led him to turn his eye upon the moral values esteemed by society as a whole.

Geography

Location

Bayreuth lies on the Red Main river, the southern of the two headstreams of the River Main, between the Fichtelgebirge Mountains and Franconian Switzerland.

Town divisions

The borough of Bayreuth is divided into 39 districts:

1: Westliche Innenstadt (''Western town centre'')

2: Östliche Innenstadt/Obere Röth (''Eastern town centre'')

3: Cosima-Wagner-Straße/ Nürnberger Straße/Universitätsstraße

4: Südöstliche Innenstadt (''Southeastern town centre'')

5: Südwestliche Innenstadt (''Southwestern town centre'')

6: Birken

7: Justus-Liebig-Straße/Quellhöfe/Rückertweg

8: Leuschnerstraße/Ludwig-Thoma-Straße

9: Saas, originated from the parish village Saas, which was mentioned as early as 1528 in connecxion with the Baptists

10: Bismarckstraße/Friedrichstraße/Moritzhöfen

11: Freiheitsplatz/Malerviertel

12. Erlanger Straße/Wolfsgasse

13: Jakobshof

14: Hetzennest/Braunhof/Fantaisiestraße

15: Meyernberg

16: Nördlicher Roter Hügel

17: Grüner Hügel/Wendelhöfen

18: Kreuz

19: Herzoghöhe/Am Bauhof

20: Nördliche Innenstadt

21: Carl-Schüller-Straße/Bürgerreuther Straße/Gutenbergstraße

22: Gartenstadt

23: Bürgerreuth/Gravenreutherstraße

24: St. Georgen/Grüner Baum/Burg

25: Östliche Hammerstatt

26: Westliche Hammerstatt

27: Bernecker Straße/Insel/Riedelsberg

28: Industriegebiete St. Georgen

29: St. Johannis

30: Neue Heimat

31: Oberkonnersreuth

32: Laineck

33: Westlicher Roter Hügel

34: Eubener Straße/Furtwänglerstraße/Schupfenschlag/Hohe Warte

35: Seulbitz

36: Aichig/Grunau

37: Thiergarten/Destuben

38: Oberpreuschwitz

39: Wolfsbach

Politics

Town council

The results of the 2008 local elections in Bavaria were as follows (in brackets the change from the 2002 elections):

CSU: 28.2 % (-3.1), 13 seats (-1)

SPD: 22.5 % (-5.4), 10 seats (-3)

BG - FW: 21,6 % (+2.0), 10 seats (+1)

Greens/indep.: 10.0 % (+2.8), 4 seats (+1)

Young Bayreuth: 5.8 % (-0,9), 2 seats (-1)

FDP: 4.4 % (+0.5), 2 seats (+1)

BT go!: 4.2 % (+4,2), 2 seats (+2)

BBL: 3.2 % (+3,2), 1 seat (+1)

Others: 0.0 % (-3,4), 0 seats (-1)

(Lord) Mayors of Bayreuth since 1818

1818–1848: Erhard Christian Hagen von Hagenfels (First legally trained mayor)

1851–1863: Friedrich Karl Dilchert (civic mayor)

1863–1900: Theodor von Muncker (legally trained mayor)

1900–1918: Dr. Leopold von Casselmann (legally trained mayor, lord mayor from 1907)

1919–30 April 1933: Albert Preu (lord mayor)

1 May 1933–June 1937: Dr. Karl Schlumprecht (lord mayor; NSDAP)

21 July 1937–April 1938: Dr. Otto Schmidt (lord mayor; NSDAP)

3 May 1938–30 June 1938: Fritz Wächtler (Gauleiter, self-proclaimed commissarial lord mayor; NSDAP)

1 July 1938–April 1945: Dr. Fritz Kempfler (lord mayor; NSDAP)

24 April 1945–November 1945: Dr. Joseph Kauper (lord mayor)

November 1945–30 June 1948: Dr. Oscar Meyer (lord mayor)

1 July 1948–30 April 1958: Hans Rollwagen (lord mayor; SPD)

1 May 1958–30 April 1988: Hans Walter Wild (lord mayor; SPD)

1 May 1988–30 April 2006: Dr. Dieter Mronz (lord mayor; SPD)

since 1 May 2006: Dr. Michael Hohl (lord mayor; CSU)

Twin towns

The town of Bayreuth has twinning partnerships with the following towns: Annecy, France, since 1966 Rudolstadt, Thuringia, since 1990 La Spezia, Italy, since 1999 District 6, Prague, Czech Republic, since 2008

Further twinnings with other European towns are planned. Under discussion are Shrewsbury, United Kingdom, and Tekirdağ in western Turkey.

There is also a cultural partnership with the state of Burgenland, Austria, and a university partnership between the University of Bayreuth and the Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Virginia.

Sponsorship

In 1955 Bayreuth took on sponsorship for displaced Sudeten Germans from the town of Franzensbad in Okres Cheb.

Coat of arms

Margrave Albert Achilles, who was also Elector of Brandenburg, presented the town Bayreuth in December 1457 which the coat of arms that it still bears today. Two fields show the black and white coat of arms of the Hohenzollerns. The black lion on gold with a red and white border was the municipal coat of arms of the burgraves of Nuremberg. Along the two diagonals are two ''Reuten'', small triangular shovels with a slightly bent shaft. They represent the ending ''-reuth'' in the town's name.“

Culture and places of interest

Theatre

The Margravial Opera House was opened in 1748 and is one of the finest Baroque theatres in Europe. It is both a museum and the oldest working ''tableau'' in Bayreuth.

The Festival Hall dates to the 19th century and is now used solely for the Bayreuth Festival. Only works by Richard Wagner are put on.

The Bayreuth Town House (''Stadthaus''), likewise, does not have its own ensemble. It is regularly used by the ''Theater Hof'' as well as the ''Tourneetheater''.

The only two theatres with their own ensemble are the ''Studiobühne Bayreuth'' and amateur dramatic society, ''Brandenburg Kulturstadl''. The venues of the studio theatre in Bayreuth are the domicile of the theatre in the ''Röntgenstraße'', the ruins of the Bayreuth Hermitage and the courtyard of Bayreuth piano manufacturer, Steingraeber & Söhne.

Museums

The Richard Wagner Museum at Wahnfried House was the residence of Richard Wagner and his family's home until 1966. Since 1976 it has been a museum with attached national archives and a research centre for the Richard Wagner Foundation in Bayreuth

The Jean Paul Museum in the former residence of Richard Wagner's daughter, Eva Chamberlain, with autographs, first editions of works, portraits and other pictorial material

The Franz Liszt Museum in the house where Franz Liszt died, with about 300 photographs, scripts and printed papers from the collection of the Munich pianist, Ernst Burger, which were bought by the town of Bayreuth. In addition there is a ''Stummklavier'', the Ibach wing of Haus Wahnfried, letters and first editions of Franz Liszt. Biographic information boards, a mould of the font from Liszt's birthplace Raiding and Liszt busts by Antonio Galli enhance the collection. Visits are accompanied by the music of Franz Liszt

The Historical Museum in the Old Latin School on ''Kirchplatz''. On the ground floor it portrays the history and development of Bayreuth from the late Middle Ages to the 20th century with a model of the town in the year 1763. On the first floor are divisions covering the art and cultural history of Bayreuth's margravial period (17th and 18th centuries). Another division portrays arts and crafts in Bayreuth and the surrounding area with examples of faience pottery, glass products from the Fichtelgebirge and stone pottery from Creußen. Painting, crafts, and early industrial artefacts from the Biedermeier period and the late 19th century round off a visit to the museum

The Museum of Art in the Old Town Hall which contains the Helmut and Constanze Meyer Art Foundation, the Georg Tappert collection and the archives and collection of Caspar Walter Rauh. The collections contain key works from the 20th century

The British American Tobacco's Historical Collection in the old Lord Mayor's rooms of the Old Town Hall

The German Typewriter Museum with a collection of over 400 historic typewriters from the Research and Training Centre for Shorthand and Word Processing in Bayreuth

A branch of the Bavarian State Painting Collection was opened in the New Palace in August 2007. 80 works from Dutch and German painters of the late 17th century and 18th century are displayed.

The Archaeological Museum in the Italian Building of the New Palace was founded in 1827 by the Historic Society. Its eight exhibition rooms include artefacts such as New Stone Age stone axes, 80 pottery jars from the Hallstatt era and Celtic bronze jewellery. The discoveries on display, which all come from eastern Upper Franconia, especially Franconian Switzerland and the region around Bayreuth, date from the Old Stone Age to the Middle Ages. In the experimental field there is a reconstructed loom, a rock drill and an original ''Schiebemühle''.

Maisel's Brewery and Cooper's Museum, which teaches everything about the production of Weizen beer on a layout, making it the largest brewery in the world, not least due to its collection of over 5,500 beer glasses and mugs).

The Upper Franconia Prehistory Museum portrays the history of life in Upper Franconia since the beginning of the world. Exhibitions are constantly changing; currently the life-size dinosaurs attract especial interest.

Bayreuth Football Museum (''Altstadt-Kult-Museum'' of SpVgg Bayreuth)

The Bayreuth of Wilhelmina Museum in the New Castle

Fire Brigade Museum

Iwalewa House, the Africa Centre of the University of Bayreuth

Johann Baptist Graser School Museum

Catacombs of the Bayreuth Aktien Brewery

Little Poster Museum

Margravial state rooms and collection of Bayreuth faiences in the New Castle

Museum of Agricultural Tools and Equipment

Lindenhof Natural History Museum

Richard Wagner Gymnasium School Museum

Wedlich Transport Museum

Walküre Porcelain Museum

Wilhelm Leuschner Memorial

Wo Sarazen Art

Buildings

The Hermitage (''Eremitage'')

Thiergarten Hunting Lodge (''Jagdschloss Thiergarten'')

New Palace (''Neues Schloss'') and court garden, seat of the margraves from 1753

St. Georgen Castle (''Ordensschloss St. Georgen'')

St. Georgen Church (''Ordenskirche St. Georgen'')

St. John's Parish Church (''St. Johannis'')

Colmdorf Castle

''Rollwenzelei'' with Jean Paul's study (''Dichterstube'')

Old Palace and castle chapel of Our Dear Lady (''Altes Schloss'')

Victory Tower (''Siegesturm'')

Spital Church (''Spitalkirche'')

Church of the Holy Spirit (''Stadtkirche Heilig Dreifaltigkeit'')

Stift church (''Stiftskirche'')

Birken Castle

The ''Goldener Anker'' hotel

Baroque parks:

* Hermitage Park, former seat of the margraves, outside the inner town

* Castle and park of ''Fantaisie'', in the vicinity of Bayreuth

* ''Sanspareil'' Park, about 30 km west of Bayreuth

University Botanical Gardens

Public parks and cemeteries

In the town centre is the Court Garden (''Hofgarten'') of the New Palace. Near the Festival Hall is the Festival Park. On the southern edge of the town lie the Botanical Gardens of the University of Bayreuth. On the ''Königsallee'', east of the town centre, is the relatively small Miedel Garden.

The best known park in Bayreuth is that of the Hermitage in the district of St. Johannis. With a total area of almost 50 hectares it is the largest park in Bayreuth.

Bayreuth has been chosen to host the Bavarian Country Garden Show in 2016. For this reason another park is planned on the Main water meadows between the Volksfestplatz and A 9 motorway.

The oldest surviving cemetery is the Town Cemetery (''Stadtfriedhof'') with a large number of gravestones of famous people. On the southern edge of the town is the Southern Cemetery (''Südfriedhof'') abd crematorium. The districts of St. Johannis and St. Georgen have their own cemeteries. On ''Nürnberger Straße'', in the east of the town, is an Israeli cemetery.

Sport

Over 60 clubs offer just under one hundreds sports. The most successful club in the town is the street hockey team, Hurricans Bayreuth, who have been German runners-up three times (1998/2004/2006) and champions five times (1996/1997/2001/2005/2007). The only other first division team is the Bayreuth Gliding Club which won the league in 2002 and were runners-up in 2005 and 2008. They were also fourth in the World League in 2008. The basketball team of BBC Bayreuth plays in the Basketball Bundesliga (division 1), the HaSpo Bayreuth handball team, the footballers of SpVgg Bayreuth and the volleyball players of BSV Bayreuth each play in their respective Bavarian League. The ice hockey team, EHC Bayreuth, has also just entered the Bavarian League.

Bayreuth had its sporting heyday in the late 1980s and early 90s. The basketball team, Steiner Bayreuth, were twice German Cup winners (1987/1988 and 1988/1989) and in the 1988/1989 season they also won the German championship. The hockey team of Bayreuth's swimming club (SCC) was twice champions of Second Division South and also played for a year in the Hockey League. At the time that the table tennis team of Steiner Bayreuth was also first class (since 1983 2nd Division, in 1984/85, 1986/87 and 1987/88 1st Division, 1988 relegated and the team has played for many years in the 2nd Football Division. The table tennis players of the 1. Bayreuth FC played in the 1st Division from 1994 to 1997.

In 1999 the World Glider Championships took place in Bayreuth.

Regular events

In January, May, June, July, November and December: Young master pianists (concert series for young pianists from various music academies in the rooms of piano makers, Steingraeber & Söhne)

April: Bayreuth Easter Festival (charity concerts for children with cancer)

May: Musica Bayreuth

June: Uniopenair

June: Time for New Music

June: Bayreuth Folk Festival

July: Bayreuth Town Festival (on the first weekend in July)

July: Bayreuth Piano Festival

July–August: Bayreuth Festival, Midsummer Night Festival

September: Rock in Bayreuth

September: Bayreuth Baroque (opera performances in the Margravial Opera House)

October: Bayreuth ''Kneipen'' Festival

October: Bayreuth Museum Night (the day before the clocks go back)

October: Since 2008 the town had awarded annually the Margravine Wilhelmina Prize of the Town of Bayreuth as part of the Bayreuth Future Forum symposium of the University of Bayreuth

Economy and infrastructure

Transport

Long-distance roads

Motorways (''Autobahnen''):

A 9: Berlin–Leipzig–''Bayreuth''–Nuremberg–Ingolstadt–Munich

A 70: Schweinfurt–Bamberg–''Bayreuth''

Federal roads (''Bundesstraßen''):

B 2: Rosow–Berlin–Lutherstadt Wittenberg–Leipzig–Gera–Hof–''Bayreuth''–Nuremnberg–Donauwörth–Augsburg–Munich–Mittenwald

B 22: Würzburg–Bamberg–Hollfeld–''Bayreuth''–Weiden–Cham

B 85: Berga–Weimar–Ludwigsstadt–Kulmbach–''Bayreuth''–Amberg–Schwandorf–Cham–Neukirchen vorm Wald–Passau

Railways

From Bayreuth Central Station (''Hauptbahnhof'') railway lines run north to Neuenmarkt-Wirsberg, and from there to Bamberg and over the Schiefe Ebene to Hof, east to Weidenberg, southeast to Weiden and south to Schnabelwaid with connexions to Nuremberg on the Pegnitz Valley Railway. The lines around Bayreuth are all single-tracked and non-electrified.

Since 23 May 1992 tilting diesel multiple units of Class 610 have worked the last-named route. These were bought by the former Deutsche Bundesbahn specifically for the winding track. Since the 2006/2007 timetable change, Bayreuth has no longer been connected to the DB's long-distance network.

The Franken-Sachsen-Express still provides a direct connexion to Dresden, however, and since December 2007 even every two hours. The technology used for this is the Class 612 diesel multiple set. There are also Regional Express links via Lichtenfels to Bamberg and Würzburg, and via Lichtenfels and Kronach to Saalfeld.

Local public transport

The town bus routes are operated by Bayreuth Transport and Public Baths (BVB) (''Bayreuther Verkehrs- und Bäder GmbH''). Sometimes private bus operators run services on behalf of the transport companies. The 14 routes (lines 301-314) operate from Monday to Friday at 20 or 30 minute intervals; on Saturday afternoon and Sunday the interval is extended to 40 minutes. Late evening services (from about 10-11 pm during the week and from 1 am at weekends) and on Sunday mornings a simplified network of four lines (lines 321-324) runs buses at 45-minute intervals. Some lines then operate like an on-call taxi service. The network is star-shaped. Originally, the central station was at the market square in ''Maximilianstrasse''. Since 27 October 2007 the Central Bus Station (ZOH) has been at ''Hohenzollernplatz'' at the junction of ''Kanalstraße'' on the ''Hohenzollernring''. At this stop there are also bus stops for local buses to facilitate transfers.

Regional rail is operated by the Omnibusverkehr Franken. From 1 January 2010 public transport from the town and district of Bayreuth was integrated into the Nuremberg Regional Transport Network (''Verkehrsverbund Großraum Nürnberg'').

Cycling

In most places there is a signed cycle path network. In the centre of Bayreuth itself, cycling is fairly straightforward due to the relatively flat topography, something which encourages the use bicycles as an everyday means of transport. Because of the proximity of the 600 kilometre long Main Cycle Path, Bayreuth is also a destination for many tourist cycle routes. Because of the long service intervals of the Bayreuth town bus system and its long overnight pause, students use bicycles as their everyday mode of transport. Bicycles may be carried for a fee on DB Regio trains leaving Bayreuth and in the VGN's buses.

Air transport

The local airport supports Bayreuth's commercial aviation traffic, individual business travel, general aviation and air sports. By 2002 even the airline from Frankfurt to Hof stopped in Bayreuth three times a day.

The airfield at Bindlacher Berg is also one of the most important bases for gliding in Germany. For example, the World Championships took place here in 1999. For the air sports community in Bayreuth, the airport is a departure point for glider flights taking part in the national Bundesliga competition league. The local gliding club also provides instruction in flying gliders and light aircraft.

See also: '' Bayreuth Airport''.

Important firms

Basell Bayreuth Chemie (Producer of polyolefins)

Brauerei Gebrüder Maisel (wheat beer specialist)

British American Tobacco (Germany) GmbH (cigarette production)

Cherry (Data entry devices, switches and sensors, car motifs)

Grundig Business Systems (world market leader for professional dictaphone systems)

W. Markgraf (construction)

medi (medical aids)

Stäubli (textile machines, technical couplings and robot arms)

Steingraeber & Söhne piano manufacturers

Zapf (manufacturer of ready-made garages and houses)

Former important firms

F. C. Bayerlein 1809-1979 (textile company: weaving, spinning, cotton-spinning and dying)

Media

Nordbayerischer Kurier (dail paper)

Fränkische Zeitung (FZ) ; formerly the Bayreuther Anzeiger, renamed in October 2008 (advertising paper)

Bayreuther Sonntag (advertising paper)

Bayreuth4U (town magazine)

Bayerischer Rundfunk (North Upper Franconia correspondent office). In the 1950s/1960s Bayerische Rundfunk operated einen radio station in Bayreuth on medium wave with a frequency of 520 kHz and a transmitter power of 200 watts using a 60 metre high transmission mast.

Campus TV (University of Bayreuth media project in media science)

Der Tip (University of Bayreuth student paper)

Oberfränkische Wirtschaft, (trade magazine for Upper Franconia)

Radio Galaxy (local radio station for the Bavaria-wide youth radio)

Radio Mainwelle (local radio)

Schalltwerk (University of Bayreuth internet radio)

Garrison

For centuries Bayreuth was also a garrison town for the Prussian Army, Royal Bavarian Army, ''Reichswehr'', ''Wehrmacht'', US Army, German Army (''Bundeswehr'') and the German Border Police (''Bundesgrenzschutz''). In the early 1990s, following the end of the Cold War the garrison tradition of the town came to an end when the ''Bundeswehr's'' Margrave Barracks (''Markgrafenkaserne'') and the Röhrensee Barracks (''Röhrenseekaserne''), used by the US Army and the BGS (''Grenzschutzabteilung Süd 3''), were closed.

Gallery

Famous people

Princess Wilhelmine of Bayreuth (1709–1758), monarch

Johann David Schoepf (1752–1800), naturalist

Johann Christian Ritter (1755-?), first printer in South Africa

Jean Paul (1763–1825), writer

Max Stirner (1806–1856), philosopher

Richard Wagner (1813–1883), composer

Oskar Panizza (1853–1921), psychiatrist, dissident author

Fritz Rasp (1891–1976), actor

Generalfeldmarschall Robert Ritter von Greim (1892–1945), soldier and aviator

Florian Mayer (1983— ) professional tennis player

Anne Haug (1983-) professional triathlete

Philipp Petzschner (1984— ), professional tennis player

Maya Karin (1979— ), Malaysian actress, television personality, and singer

References

External links

Official website University of Bayreuth website

Bayreuther Festspiele website

Images from Bayreuth

Category:Bayreuth district

af:Bayreuth ar:بايرويت bar:Bayreith br:Bayreuth bg:Байройт ca:Bayreuth cv:Байройт cs:Bayreuth cy:Bayreuth da:Bayreuth de:Bayreuth et:Bayreuth el:Μπαϊρόιτ es:Bayreuth eo:Bayreuth eu:Bayreuth fa:بایرویت fr:Bayreuth ko:바이로이트 id:Bayreuth is:Bayreuth it:Bayreuth he:ביירוית la:Baruthum lb:Bayreuth lmo:Bayreuth hu:Bayreuth nl:Bayreuth (stad) ja:バイロイト no:Bayreuth nn:Bayreuth pl:Bayreuth pt:Bayreuth ro:Bayreuth ru:Байройт sc:Bayreuth simple:Bayreuth sk:Bayreuth sl:Bayreuth sr:Бајројт fi:Bayreuth sv:Bayreuth uk:Байройт vi:Bayreuth vo:Bayreuth war:Bayreuth zh:拜罗伊特

Coordinates	37°46′45.48″N122°25′9.12″N
name	Klaus Schulze
background	non_vocal_instrumentalist
born	August 04, 1947
origin	Berlin, Germany
genre	Electronic musicNew Age musicSpace musicTrance musicKrautrock/Kosmische MusikBerlin School
occupation	Musician, Producer
years active	1969–present
label	OhrBrain/PolyGram RecordsVirgin RecordsMetronomeManikin RecordsIsland RecordsICInteamZYX RecordsWEARainhorseSynthetic SymphonyFAX +49-69/450464
associated acts	Tangerine DreamAsh Ra TempelCosmic Jokers
website	Official Site
notable instruments	}}

Klaus Schulze (born 4 August 1947) is a German electronic music composer and musician. He also used the alias Richard Wahnfried. He was briefly a member of the electronic bands Tangerine Dream and Ash Ra Tempel before launching a solo career consisting of more than 60 albums lasting five decades.

History

1970s

In 1969, Klaus Schulze was the drummer of one of the early incarnations of Tangerine Dream for their debut album ''Electronic Meditation''. Before 1969 he was a drummer in a band called Psy Free. He met Edgar Froese from Tangerine Dream in the ZODIAC CLUB in Berlin in that time West-Germany. In 1970 he left this group to form Ash Ra Tempel with Manuel Göttsching and Harmut Enke. In 1971, he chose again to leave a newly-formed group after only one album, this time to mount a solo career. In 1972, Schulze released his debut album ''Irrlicht'' with organ and a recording of an orchestra filtered almost beyond recognition. Despite the lack of synthesizers, this proto-ambient work is regarded as a milestone in electronic music. The follow-up, ''Cyborg'', was similar but added the EMS Synthi A synthesizer.

Since this point, Schulze's career has been most prolific, and he can now claim more than 40 original albums to his name since ''Irrlicht''. Highlights of these include 1975's ''Timewind'', 1976's ''Moondawn'' (his first album to feature the Moog modular synthesizer), 1979's ''Dune'', and 1995's double-album ''In Blue'' (which featured one long track called Return To The Tempel with electric guitar contributions from his friend Manuel Göttsching of Ash Ra Tempel). In 1976, he was drafted by Japanese percussionist and composer Stomu Yamashta to join his short-lived "supergroup" Go, also featuring Steve Winwood, Michael Shrieve and Al Di Meola. They released two studio albums (''Go'' in 1976 and ''Go Too'' in 1977) and one live album ("Live from Paris" recorded in 1976 and released in '77) which went on to become a cult favourite.

Throughout the 1970s he followed closely in the footsteps of Tangerine Dream, albeit with far lighter sequencer lines and a more reflective, dreamy edge, not unlike the ambient music of his contemporary Brian Eno. It is to be noted that some of his lighter albums are appreciated by New Age music fans, despite the fact that Schulze has always denied connections to this genre.

Klaus Schulze had a more organic sound than other electronic artists of the time. Often he would throw in decidedly non-electronic sounds such as acoustic guitar and a male operatic voice in ''Blackdance'', or a cello in ''Dune'' and ''Trancefer''. Schulze developed a Minimoog technique that sounds uncannily like an electric guitar, which is quite impressive in concert. Schulze often takes German events as a starting point for his compositions, a notable example being on his 1978 album ''"X"'' (the title signifying it was his tenth album), subtitled "Six Musical Biographies", a reference to such notables as Ludwig II of Bavaria, Friedrich Nietzsche, Georg Trakl and Wilhelm Friedemann Bach. His use of the pseudonym ''Richard Wahnfried'' is indicative of his interest in Richard Wagner, a clear influence on some albums like the aforementioned ''Timewind''.

1980s

In the 1980s Schulze moved from analog to digital instruments, and his work accordingly became less experimental and more accessible. Although the switch to purely digital recording and instruments is evident in the style of ''Dig It'' (1980) It was not until the release of ''Trancefer'' (1981) that the shift in style became evident. ''Trancefer'' was far more obviously reliant on sequencers than previous recordings, and the resultant effect transformed Schulze's style from gentle melodic journeys to an ever-growing crescendo of music consisting of multi-layered rhythmical passages. This is particularly evident in the ''Trancefer'''s first track "A Few Minutes After Trancefer", although the second track "Silent Running" is more reminiscent of Schulze's earlier works.

This newer style can also be found in Schulze's next release ''Audentity''. Both "Cellistica" and "Spielglocken" are composed in a similar, sequencer based, style as ''Trancefer'', but this is certainly not the case of all of ''Audentity'''s tracks, indeed "Sebastian in Traum" hints towards the Operatic style to be found in some of Schulze's much later work. The predominance of sequencing can also be found in the follow-up live album ''Dziękuję Poland Live '83'', although it should be noted that many of its tracks are re-workings of those to be found on ''Audentity''. Schulze's next studio-based album ''Angst'' (soundtrack to the namesake 1983 film) moved away from the harshness of sharp, heavily sequenced style of the 3 previous albums and, once again, had the more "organic feel" of earlier recordings.

Another highlight of this era was ''En=Trance'' with the dreamy cut "FM Delight". The album ''Miditerranean Pads'' marked the beginning of very complex percussion arrangements that continued into the next two decades.

In 1989, German band Alphaville released their album ''The Breathtaking Blue'', on which Klaus Schulze was both a contributing musician (partially) and the album's producer.

1990s

Starting with ''Beyond Recall'', the first half of the 1990s was the notorious "sample" period, when Schulze used a wide variety of pre-recorded sounds such as screeching birds and sensuous female moans in his studio albums and live performances. Sampling was such an unpopular diversion that when ''In Blue'' was released in 1995 without samples it was hailed as a return to form. The decade also saw the release of copious amounts of previously unreleased material, of varying quality, in several limited-edition boxed sets. Some live recordings were discovered on pristine but forgotten reels of tape which had been used to provide echo in concerts.

2000s

Recently Schulze began incorporating elements of jazz and classical music, working with more contemporary electronic dance music such as trance, and creating two operas, the second still awaiting release. Also, in 2005 he began re-releasing his classic solo and Wahnfried albums with bonus tracks of unreleased material recorded at roughly the same time as the original works. In the last several years, Schulze has produced albums and staged numerous live appearances with Lisa Gerrard.

2010s

With the release of his fortieth album (''Big in Japan: Live in Tokyo 2010'') in September 2010, Klaus Schulze entered his fifth decade as a solo musician. He's currently working on his next album, Shadowlands, to be released in 2011.

Richard Wahnfried

''Richard Wahnfried'', then simply ''Wahnfried'' after 1993, is the long-time and only real alias for Klaus Schulze – originally a pseudonym, later an official side project name. Seven albums were released under this name between 1979 and 1997.

The main characteristics of the Wahnfried albums (as opposed to Schulze's regular works) are:

Often being oriented towards more mainstream genres (some would say "more commercial"), such as rock, dance, techno and trance.

Always allowing for collaborative and less electronic albums, with known or unknown guest musicians performing along Schulze's synths.

The pseudonym's etymology stems from Schulze's love for Richard Wagner:

Richard, evidently from Wagner's first name. Richard is also the name of Schulze's first son.

Wahnfried ("Peace from delusion and/or madness", in German), from the name Wagner gave to his villa in Bayreuth (and where he was later buried).

In his 1975 album ''Timewind'' (four years before the first alias use), Schulze had already named a track "Wahnfried 1883" (in reference to Wagner's death and burial in his Wahnfried's garden in 1883). The other track on ''Timewind'' is called "Bayreuth Return". After 1993, the albums are simply credited to "Wahnfried", and namedrop Schulze ("featuring Klaus Schulze", "Produced by Klaus Schulze").

"Wahnfried" is the only known alias of Schulze (albeit on the 1998 ''Tribute to Klaus Schulze'' album, among 10 other artists, Schulze contributed one track barely hidden behind the "Schulzendorfer Groove Orchester" pseudonym).

Discography

Albums

Schulze's concert performances are original compositions recorded live and thus listed as albums. An intensive reissue program of Schulze CDs began in 2005, with most releases having bonus tracks, and sometimes additional discs. They are published by the label Revisited Records (a division of German company InsideOut Music 1), and distributed by SPV.

! Year	! Title	! Reissued
1972		2006
1973		2007
1974	''Blackdance''	2007
1975	''Picture Music''	2005
1975	''Timewind''	2006
1976	''Moondawn''	2005
1977	''Body Love'' (soundtrack)	2005
1977		2005
1977	''Body Love Vol. 2''	2007
1978		2005
1979		2005
1980	''...Live...''	2007
1980		2005
1981	''Trancefer''	2006
1983	''Audentity''	2005
1983		2006
1984		2005
1985	''Inter*Face''	2006
1986		2005
1988	''En=Trance''	2005
1990	''Miditerranean Pads''	2005
1990	''The Dresden Performance'' (live)
1991	''Beyond Recall''
1992	''Royal Festival Hall Vol. 1'' (live)
1992	''Royal Festival Hall Vol. 2'' (live)
1993	''The Dome Event'' (live)
1994	''Le Moulin de Daudet'' (soundtrack)	2005
1994	''Goes Classic''
1994	''Totentag''
1994	''Das Wagner Desaster Live'' (live)	2005
1995		2005
1996	''Are You Sequenced?'' (live)	2006
1997	''Dosburg Online'' (live)	2006
2001	''Live @ KlangArt'' (live)	2008
2005	''Moonlake''
2007	''Kontinuum''
2008
2008
2009	''Dziękuję Bardzo'' (live, with Lisa Gerrard)
2010	''Big in Japan: Live in Tokyo 2010'' (live)

Richard Wahnfried albums

Composed by Schulze and performed with guest artists under alias ''Richard Wahnfried'':

! Year	! Title	! Reissued
1979	''Time Actor''
1981	''Tonwelle''
1984
1986	''Miditation''
1994	''Trancelation''
1996	''Trance Appeal''	2007
1997	''Drums 'n' Balls (The Gancha Dub)''	2006

Boxed sets

Between 1993 and 2002 Klaus Schulze released several limited edition boxed sets, all composed of non-album material.

''Historic Edition'' ''Jubilee Edition'' ''The Ultimate Edition'' ''Contemporary Works I'' ''Contemporary Works II''

Year !! Title !! Discs !! Copies
1993	''Silver Edition''	10
1995	|	10	2000
1997	|	25	1000
2000	|	50
2000	|	10
2002	|	5	2002

;Notes: :Collecting ''Silver'', ''Historic'', and ''Jubilee'' sets, with additional 5 discs. :A bonus sixth disc included with the first 333 copies.

Reissues from sets

! Year	! Title	! From
2005	''Vanity of Sounds''	''Contemporary Works I'' (2000)
2006	''The Crime of Suspense''	''Contemporary Works I'' (2000)
2006	''Ballett 1''	''Contemporary Works I'' (2000)
2006	''Ballett 2''	''Contemporary Works I'' (2000)
2007	''Ballett 3''	''Contemporary Works I'' (2000)
2007	''Ballett 4''	''Contemporary Works I'' (2000)
2008	''Virtual Outback''	''Contemporary Works II'' (2002)
2009		''The Ultimate Edition'' (2000)
2009		''The Ultimate Edition'' (2000)
2009		''The Ultimate Edition'' (2000)
2009		''The Ultimate Edition'' (2000)
2010		''The Ultimate Edition'' (2000)
2010		''The Ultimate Edition'' (2000)
2010		''The Ultimate Edition'' (2000)
2010		''The Ultimate Edition'' (2000)
2011		''The Ultimate Edition'' (2000)
2011		''The Ultimate Edition'' (2000)

''The Dark Side of the Moog'' series

The Dark Side of the Moog is a Klaus Schulze collaboration with Pete Namlook (joined also by Bill Laswell on volumes 4 to 7). Each title is a distortion of Pink Floyd song and album titles.

Year !! Title !! Pink Floyd Title
1994	''The Dark Side of the Moog: Wish You Were There''	Wish You Were Here (Pink Floyd song)>Wish You Were Here"
1994
1995
1996	''The Dark Side of the Moog IV: Three Pipers at the Gates of Dawn''
1996	''The Dark Side of the Moog V: Psychedelic Brunch''
1997
1998
1999	''The Dark Side of the Moog VIII: Careful With the AKS, Peter''
2002	''The Dark Side of the Moog: The Evolution of the Dark Side of the Moog''
2002
2005	''The Dark Side of the Moog X: Astro Know Me Domina''
2008	''The Dark Side of the Moog XI: The Heart of Our Nearest Star''

''The Evolution of the Dark Side of the Moog'' is a compilation album, containing excerpts from the first 8 volumes. The series was announced as officially concluded with volume 10 when on 21 March 2005 at 14:52 CET, Pete Namlook sold the Big Moog synthesizer that was the symbol of the series. However, a volume 11 appeared on Namlook's website on 15 April 2008.

Collaborations

''Go (Go album)

Year !! Title !! Collaborator
1970	''Electronic Meditation''	Tangerine Dream
1971	Ash Ra Tempel (album)>Ash Ra Tempel''
1973	Tarot (Walter Wegmüller album)>Tarot''
1973	''Join Inn''
1973	''Lord Krishna von Goloka''
1974	The Cosmic Jokers (album)>The Cosmic Jokers''
1974	''Planeten Sit-In''
1974	''Galactic Supermarket''
1974	''Sci Fi Party''
1974	''Gilles Zeitschiff''
1974	''Planet of Man''
1976	Go'' || Go
1976	Go Live from Paris'' >
1977	Go Too'' >
1979	French Skyline'' >
1984	Aphrica'' >
1984	Drive Inn (album)>Drive Inn''
1984	''Transfer Station Blue''
1987	Babel (album)>Babel''
2000	Friendship (Ash Ra Tempel album)>Friendship''
2000	''Gin Rosé at the Royal Festival Hall''
2009	''Come Quietly''

Promos

2003 ''Andromeda''

2004 ''Ion''

2009 ''Hommage à Polska'' (with Lisa Gerrard)

Compilations

1991 ''2001''

1994 ''The Essential 72–93''

1999 ''Trailer''

Lone tracks

This list includes only the tracks remaining uncollected after ''Lone Tracks'' (CD 50 of ''The Ultimate Edition'').

1993 "Nachtmusik Schattenhaft"– On the ''A Brief History of Ambient – Volume 2: Imaginary Landscapes'' compilation

1994 "Conquest of Paradise" – On the ''A Tribute to Henry (Gentleman) Maske'' single; Schulze was commissioned to replay the title track of ''1492'' by Vangelis

2000 "MM 9" – On the ''The Art of Sysyphus Vol. 4'' compilation

2002 "Manikin Jubilee" – On the ''Manikin Records: First Decade 1992–2002'' compilation limited to 777 copies

2003 "CrazyShow" – on ''CrazyShow'' (Alphaville)

2003 "The Opium Den" – on ''CrazyShow'' (Alphaville)

2004 "Schrittmacher" – On the ''Schrittmacher: Tasty Tracks Vol. 1'' compilation

2008 "Zenit" – On ''Sehnsucht Live'' (Schiller)

2008 "Invisible Musik" - On the ''Muting the Noise 01'' compilation

See also

Berlin School

Kosmische Musik

References

External links

Klaus Schulze.com - The official Klaus Schulze website.

Category:New Age musicians Category:German trance musicians Category:German electronic musicians Category:Tangerine Dream members Category:1947 births Category:Virgin Records artists Category:Living people Category:Krautrock

ar:كلاوس شولتزه ca:Klaus Schulze de:Klaus Schulze es:Klaus Schulze fa:کلاوس شولتز fr:Klaus Schulze gl:Klaus Schulze it:Klaus Schulze ka:კლაუს შულცე nl:Klaus Schulze ja:クラウス・シュルツェ pl:Klaus Schulze pt:Klaus Schulze ro:Klaus Schulze ru:Шульце, Клаус fi:Klaus Schulze sv:Klaus Schulze uk:Клаус Шульце

Wilhelm Richard Wagner (; ; 22 May 1813 13 February 1883) was a German composer, conductor, theatre director and essayist, primarily known for his operas (or "music dramas", as they were later called). Wagner's compositions, particularly those of his later period, are notable for their complex texture, rich harmonies and orchestration, and the elaborate use of leitmotifs: musical themes associated with individual characters, places, ideas or plot elements. Unlike most other opera composers, Wagner wrote both the music and libretto for every one of his stage works.

Initially establishing his reputation as a composer of works such as ''The Flying Dutchman'' and ''Tannhäuser'' which were in the romantic traditions of Weber and Meyerbeer, Wagner transformed operatic thought through his concept of the ''Gesamtkunstwerk'' ("total work of art"). This would achieve the synthesis of all the poetic, visual, musical and dramatic arts, and was announced in a series of essays between 1849 and 1852. Wagner realised this concept most fully in the first half of the monumental four-opera cycle ''Der Ring des Nibelungen''. However, his thoughts on the relative importance of music and drama were to change again and he reintroduced some traditional operatic forms into his last few stage works including ''Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg''.

Wagner pioneered advances in musical language, such as extreme chromaticism and quickly shifting tonal centres, which greatly influenced the development of European classical music. His ''Tristan und Isolde'' is sometimes described as marking the start of modern music. Wagner's influence spread beyond music into philosophy, literature, the visual arts and theatre. He had his own opera house built, the Bayreuth Festspielhaus, which contained many novel design features. It was here that the ''Ring'' and ''Parsifal'' received their premieres and where his most important stage works continue to be performed today in an annual festival run by his descendants. Wagner's views on conducting were also highly influential. His extensive writings on music, drama and politics have all attracted extensive comment in recent decades, especially where they have antisemitic content.

Wagner achieved all of this despite a life characterised, until his last decades, by political exile, turbulent love affairs, poverty and repeated flight from his creditors. His pugnacious personality and often outspoken views on music, politics and society made him a controversial figure during his life, which he remains to this day. The impact of his ideas can be traced in many of the arts throughout the twentieth century.

Biography

Early years

Richard Wagner was born at No. 3 ('The House of the Red and White Lions'), the Brühl, in the Jewish quarter of Leipzig, the ninth child of Carl Friedrich Wagner, who was a clerk in the Leipzig police service, and his wife Johanna Rosine (née Paetz), the daughter of a baker. Wagner's father died of typhus six months after Richard's birth, following which Wagner's mother began living with the actor and playwright Ludwig Geyer, who had been a friend of Richard's father. In August 1814 Johanna married Geyer, and moved with her family to his residence in Dresden. Until he was fourteen, Wagner was known as Wilhelm Richard Geyer. He almost certainly suspected that Geyer was his natural father.

Geyer's love of the theatre was shared by his stepson, and Wagner took part in his performances. In his autobiography, Wagner recalled once playing the part of an angel. The boy Wagner was also hugely impressed by the Gothic elements of Weber's ''Der Freischütz''. In late 1820, Wagner was enrolled at Pastor Wetzel's school at Possendorf, near Dresden, where he received some piano instruction from his Latin teacher. He could not manage a proper scale but preferred playing theatre overtures by ear. Geyer died in 1821, when Richard was eight. Subsequently, Wagner was sent to the Kreuz Grammar School in Dresden, paid for by Geyer's brother. The young Wagner entertained ambitions as a playwright, his first creative effort (listed as 'WWV 1') being a tragedy, ''Leubald'', begun at school in 1826, which was strongly influenced by Shakespeare and Goethe. Wagner was determined to set it to music; he persuaded his family to allow him music lessons.

By 1827, the family had moved back to Leipzig. Wagner's first lessons in harmony were taken in 1828–1831 with Christian Gottlieb Müller. In January 1828 he first heard Beethoven's 7th Symphony and then, in March, Beethoven's 9th Symphony performed in the Gewandhaus. Beethoven became his inspiration, and Wagner wrote a piano transcription of the 9th Symphony. He was also greatly impressed by a performance of the Requiem of Mozart. From this period date Wagner's early piano sonatas and his first attempts at orchestral overtures.

In 1829 he saw the dramatic soprano Wilhelmine Schröder-Devrient on stage, and she became his ideal of the fusion of drama and music in opera. In his autobiography, Wagner wrote, "If I look back on my life as a whole, I can find no event that produced so profound an impression upon me." Wagner claimed to have seen Schröder-Devrient in the title role of ''Fidelio''; however, it seems more likely that he saw her performance as Romeo in Bellini's ''I Capuleti e i Montecchi.''

He enrolled at the University of Leipzig in 1831 where he became a member of the Studentenverbindung Corps Saxonia Leipzig. He also took composition lessons with the cantor of Saint Thomas Church, Christian Theodor Weinlig. Weinlig was so impressed with Wagner's musical ability that he refused any payment for his lessons, and arranged for Wagner's piano sonata in B flat (which was consequently dedicated to him) to be published as the composer's op. 1. A year later, Wagner composed his ''Symphony in C major'', a Beethovenesque work performed in Prague in 1832 and at the Leipzig Gewandhaus in 1833. He then began to work on an opera, ''Die Hochzeit'' (The Wedding), which he never completed.

In 1833, Wagner's older brother Karl Albert managed to obtain Richard a position as choir master in Würzburg. In the same year, at the age of 20, Wagner composed his first complete opera, ''Die Feen'' (''The Fairies''). This opera, which clearly imitated the style of Carl Maria von Weber, would go unproduced until half a century later, when it was premiered in Munich shortly after the composer's death in 1883.

Meanwhile, Wagner held a brief appointment as musical director at the opera house in Magdeburg during which he wrote ''Das Liebesverbot'' (''The Ban on Love''), based on Shakespeare's ''Measure for Measure''. This was staged at Magdeburg in 1836, but closed before the second performance, leaving the composer (not for the last time) in serious financial difficulties. In 1834 Wagner had fallen for the actress Christine Wilhelmine "Minna" Planer. After the disaster of ''Das Liebesverbot'' he followed her to Königsberg where she helped him to get an engagement at the theatre. The two married in Königsberg on 24 November 1836. In June 1837 Wagner moved to the city of Riga, then in the Russian Empire, where he became music director of the local opera. Minna had recently left Wagner for another man but Richard took her back; this was but the first debacle of a troubled marriage that would end in misery three decades later.

By 1839, the couple had amassed such large debts that they fled Riga to escape from creditors (debt would plague Wagner for most of his life). During their flight, they and their Newfoundland dog, ''Robber'', took a stormy sea passage to London, from which Wagner drew the inspiration for ''The Flying Dutchman'' (with a story based on a sketch by Heinrich Heine). The Wagners spent 1839 to 1842 in Paris, where Richard made a scant living writing articles and arranging operas by other composers, largely on behalf of the Schlesinger publishing house. However, he also completed his third and fourth operas ''Rienzi'' and ''The Flying Dutchman'' during this stay. His relief on leaving Paris for Dresden was recorded in his "Autobiographic Sketch" of 1842 "For the first time I saw the Rhine with hot tears in my eyes, I, poor artist, swore eternal fidelity to my German fatherland."

Dresden

Wagner had completed writing ''Rienzi'' in 1840. Largely through the strong support of Giacomo Meyerbeer, it was accepted for performance by the Dresden Court Theatre (''Hofoper'') in the German state of Saxony. In 1842, Wagner moved to Dresden, where ''Rienzi'' was staged to considerable acclaim on 20 October. Wagner lived in Dresden for the next six years, eventually being appointed the Royal Saxon Court Conductor. During this period, he staged there ''The Flying Dutchman'' (2 January 1843) and ''Tannhäuser'' (19 October 1845), the first two of his three middle-period operas. Wagner also mixed with artistic circles in Dresden, including the composer Ferdinand Hiller and the architect Gottfried Semper.

The Wagners' stay at Dresden was brought to an end by Richard's involvement in leftist politics. A nationalist movement was gaining force in the states of the German Confederation, calling for constitutional freedoms and the unification of Germany as one nation state. Richard Wagner played an enthusiastic role in the socialist wing of this movement, regularly receiving guests who included the radical editor August Röckel, and the Russian anarchist Mikhail Bakunin. He was also influenced by the ideas of Proudhon. Widespread discontent in Dresden came to a head in April 1849, when King Frederick Augustus II of Saxony rejected a new constitution. The May Uprising broke out, in which Wagner played a minor supporting role. The incipient revolution was quickly crushed by an allied force of Saxon and Prussian troops, and warrants were issued for the arrest of the revolutionaries. Wagner had to flee, first visiting Paris and then settling in Zurich.

Exile, Schopenhauer and Mathilde Wesendonck

Wagner spent the next twelve years in exile. He had completed ''Lohengrin'', the last of his middle-period operas before the Dresden uprising, and now wrote desperately to his friend Franz Liszt to have it staged in his absence. Liszt, who proved to be a true friend, eventually conducted the premiere in Weimar in August 1850.

Nevertheless, Wagner found himself in grim personal straits, isolated from the German musical world and without any income to speak of. Before leaving Dresden, he had drafted a scenario that would eventually become the four opera cycle ''Der Ring des Nibelungen''. He initially wrote the libretto for a single opera, ''Siegfrieds Tod'' (''Siegfried's Death'') in 1848. After arriving in Zurich he expanded the story to include an opera ''Der junge Siegfried'' (''Young Siegfried'') exploring the hero's background. He completed the text of the cycle by writing the libretti for ''Die Walküre'' and ''Das Rheingold'' and revising the other libretti to agree with his new concept, completing them in 1852. Meanwhile, his wife Minna, who had disliked the operas he had written after ''Rienzi'', was falling into a deepening depression and then Wagner himself fell victim to ill-health, according to Ernest Newman "largely a matter of overwrought nerves", which made it difficult for him to continue writing.

Wagner's primary published output during his first years in Zurich was a set of notable essays: "The Art-Work of the Future" (1849), in which he described a vision of opera as ''Gesamtkunstwerk'', or "total work of art", in which the various arts such as music, song, dance, poetry, visual arts, and stagecraft were unified; "Judaism in Music" (1850), a tract directed against Jewish composers; and "Opera and Drama" (1851), which described the aesthetics of drama which he was using to create the ''Ring'' operas.

Wagner began composing ''Das Rheingold'' in November 1853, following it immediately with ''Die Walküre'' in 1854. He then began work on the third opera, now called ''Siegfried'', in 1856 but finished only the first two acts before deciding to put the work aside to concentrate on a new idea: ''Tristan und Isolde''.

Wagner had two independent sources of inspiration for ''Tristan und Isolde''. The first came to him in 1854, when his poet friend Georg Herwegh introduced him to the works of the philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer. Wagner would later call this the most important event of his life. His personal circumstances certainly made him an easy convert to what he understood to be Schopenhauer's philosophy, a deeply pessimistic view of the human condition. He would remain an adherent of Schopenhauer for the rest of his life, even after his fortunes improved.

One of Schopenhauer's doctrines was that music held a supreme role amongst the arts. He claimed that music is the direct expression of the world's essence, which is blind, impulsive will. Wagner quickly embraced this claim, which must have resonated strongly despite its contradiction of his previous view, expressed in ''Opera and Drama,'' that the music in opera had to be subservient to the drama. Wagner scholars have since argued that this Schopenhauerian influence caused Wagner to assign a more commanding role to music in his later operas, including the latter half of the ''Ring'' cycle, which he had yet to compose. Many aspects of Schopenhauerian doctrine undoubtedly found their way into Wagner's subsequent libretti. For example, the self-renouncing cobbler-poet Hans Sachs in ''Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg'', generally considered Wagner's most sympathetic character, although based loosely on a historical person, is a quintessentially Schopenhauerian creation.

Wagner's second source of inspiration was the poet-writer Mathilde Wesendonck, the wife of the silk merchant Otto Wesendonck. Wagner met the Wesendoncks in Zurich in 1852. Otto, a fan of Wagner's music, placed a cottage on his estate at Wagner's disposal. During the course of the next five years, the composer was eventually to become infatuated with his patron's wife. Though Mathilde seems to have returned some of his affections, she had no intention of jeopardizing her marriage. Nevertheless, the affair inspired Wagner to put aside his work on the ''Ring'' cycle (which would not be resumed for the next twelve years) and began work on ''Tristan'', based on the Arthurian love story ''Tristan and Iseult''. While planning the opera, Wagner composed the ''Wesendonck Lieder'', five songs for voice and piano setting poems by Mathilde. Two of these settings are explicitly subtitled by Wagner as 'studies for ''Tristan und Isolde'' '.

The uneasy affair collapsed in 1858, when Minna intercepted a letter from Wagner to Mathilde. After the resulting confrontation, Wagner left Zurich alone, bound for Venice, where he sojourned in the Palazzo Giustinian. The following year, he once again moved to Paris to oversee production of a new revision of ''Tannhäuser'', staged thanks to the efforts of Princess Pauline von Metternich. The premiere of the Paris ''Tannhäuser'' in 1861 was an utter fiasco, due to disturbances caused by members of the Jockey Club. Further performances were cancelled, and Wagner hurriedly left the city.

The political ban which had been placed on Wagner in Germany after he had fled Dresden was lifted in 1861. The composer settled in Biebrich in Prussia, where he began work on ''Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg'', the idea for which had come during a visit he had made to Venice with the Wesendoncks. Despite the failure of ''Tannhäuser'' in Paris, the possibility that ''Der Ring des Nibelungen'' would never be finished, and Wagner's unhappy personal life at the time of writing it, this opera is his only mature comedy.

Between 1861 and 1864 Wagner tried to have ''Tristan und Isolde'' produced in Vienna. Despite numerous rehearsals the opera remained unperformed, and gained a reputation as being "impossible", which further added to Wagner's financial woes. In 1862, Wagner finally parted with Minna, though he (or at least his creditors) continued to support her financially until her death in 1866. He claimed to be unable to travel to her funeral due to an "inflamed finger".

Patronage of King Ludwig II

Wagner's fortunes took a dramatic upturn in 1864, when King Ludwig II succeeded to the throne of Bavaria at the age of 18. The young king, an ardent admirer of Wagner's operas since childhood, had the composer brought to Munich. He settled Wagner's considerable debts, and proposed to stage ''Tristan'', ''Die Meistersinger'', the ''Ring'', and the other operas Wagner planned. Wagner also began to dictate his autobiography, ''Mein Leben'', at the King's request. To Wagner, it seemed significant that his rescue by Ludwig coincided with his learning the news of the death of his supposed enemy Meyerbeer, noting ungratefully that "this operatic master, who had done me so much harm, should not have lived to see this day".

After grave difficulties in rehearsal, ''Tristan und Isolde'' premiered at the National Theatre in Munich on 10 June 1865, the first Wagner premiere in almost 15 years. (The premiere had been scheduled for 15 May, but had been delayed by bailiffs acting for Wagner's creditors; and also because the Isolde, Malvina Schnorr von Carolsfeld, was hoarse and needed time to recover). The conductor of this premiere was Hans von Bülow, whose wife Cosima had given birth in April that year to a daughter, named Isolde, the child not of von Bülow but of Wagner.

Cosima was 24 years younger than Wagner and was herself illegitimate, the daughter of the Countess Marie d'Agoult, who had left her husband for Franz Liszt. Liszt disapproved of his daughter seeing Wagner, though the two men were friends. The indiscreet affair scandalized Munich, and to make matters worse, Wagner fell into disfavour among members of the court, who were suspicious of his influence on the king. In December 1865, Ludwig was finally forced to ask the composer to leave Munich. He apparently also toyed with the idea of abdicating in order to follow his hero into exile, but Wagner quickly dissuaded him.

Ludwig installed Wagner at the Villa Tribschen, beside Switzerland's Lake Lucerne. ''Die Meistersinger'' was completed at Tribschen in 1867, and premièred in Munich on 21 June the following year. In October, Cosima finally convinced Hans von Bülow to grant her a divorce, but this did not materialize until after she had two more children with Wagner; another daughter, named Eva, after the heroine of ''Meistersinger'', and a son Siegfried, named for the hero of the ''Ring''. Minna Wagner had died the previous year and so Richard and Cosima were now able to marry. The wedding took place on 25 August 1870. On Christmas Day of that year, Wagner arranged a surprise performance of the ''Siegfried Idyll'' for Cosima's birthday. The marriage to Cosima lasted to the end of Wagner's life.

Bayreuth

Wagner, settled into his newfound domesticity, turned his energies toward completing the ''Ring'' cycle. At Ludwig's insistence, "special previews" of the first two works of the cycle, ''Das Rheingold'' and ''Die Walküre'', were performed at Munich in 1869 and 1870, but Wagner wanted the complete cycle to be performed in a new, specially designed opera house.

In 1871, he decided on the small town of Bayreuth as the location of his new opera house. The Wagners moved there the following year, and the foundation stone for the Bayreuth Festspielhaus ("Festival Theatre") was laid. In order to raise funds for the construction, "Wagner Societies" were formed in several cities, and Wagner himself began touring Germany conducting concerts. However, sufficient funds were raised only after King Ludwig stepped in with another large grant in 1874. Later that year, the Wagners moved into their permanent home at Bayreuth, a villa that Richard dubbed ''Wahnfried'' ("Peace/freedom from delusion/madness", in German). The expenses of Bayreuth and of Wahnfried however meant that Wagner still sought other sources of income by conducting or taking on commissions like the ''Centennial March'' for America.

The Festspielhaus finally opened on 13 August 1876 with ''Das Rheingold'', now taking its place as the first evening of the premiere of the complete ''Ring'' cycle, and has continued to be the site of the Bayreuth Festival ever since; the Festival has been overseen since 1973 by the Richard-Wagner-Stiftung (Richard Wagner Foundation), the members of which include a number of Wagner's descendants.

Last years

Following the first Bayreuth festival Wagner began work on ''Parsifal'', his final opera. The composition took four years, much of which Wagner spent in Italy for health reasons. During this period he also wrote a series of essays, including some reactionary writings on religion and art which recanted his earlier views. Many of these—including "Religion and Art" (1880) and "Hero-dom and Christendom" (1881)—appeared in the journal ''Bayreuther Blätter'', founded in 1880 by Wagner and Hans von Wolzogen for Wagnerite visitors to Bayreuth.

Wagner completed ''Parsifal'' in January 1882, and a second Bayreuth Festival was held for the new opera which was premiered on 26 May. Wagner was by this time extremely ill, having suffered through a series of increasingly severe angina attacks. During the sixteenth and final performance of ''Parsifal'' on 29 August, he secretly entered the pit during Act III, took the baton from conductor Hermann Levi, and led the performance to its conclusion.

After the Festival, the Wagner family journeyed to Venice for the winter. Wagner died of a heart attack at the age of sixty-nine on 13 February 1883 at Ca' Vendramin Calergi, a 16th century palazzo on the Grand Canal. Franz Liszt's two pieces for pianoforte solo entitled ''La lugubre gondola'' evoke the passing of a black-shrouded funerary gondola bearing Richard Wagner's remains over the Grand Canal. Wagner was buried in the garden of the Villa Wahnfried in Bayreuth.

Works

Opera

Wagner's operatic works are his primary artistic legacy.

Unlike other opera composers, who generally left the task of writing the libretto (the text and lyrics) to others, Wagner wrote his own libretti, which he referred to as "poems". Further, Wagner developed a compositional style in which the orchestra's role is equal to that of the singers. The orchestra's dramatic role, in the later operas, includes the use of leitmotivs, musical themes that can be interpreted as announcing specific characters, locales, and plot elements; their complex interweaving and evolution illuminates the progression of the drama. Ultimately he urged a new concept of opera often referred to as "music drama", (although he did not use or sanction this term himself) in which all musical poetic and dramatic elements were to be fused together—the ''Gesamtkunstwerk''.

Wagner's operas are typically characterized as belonging to three chronological periods.

Early stage (to 1842)

Wagner's first attempt at an opera, at the age of 17, was ''Die Laune des Verliebten''. This was abandoned at an early stage of composition, as was ''Die Hochzeit'' (''The Wedding''), on which Wagner worked in 1832. Wagner then completed ''Die Feen'' (''The Fairies'', 1833, unperformed in the composer's lifetime) and ''Das Liebesverbot'' (''The Ban on Love'', 1836, taken off after its first performance), before working on the aborted singspiel ''Männerlist grösser als Frauenlist (Men's cunning greater than women's)''. This was followed by ''Rienzi'' (1842), Wagner's first opera to be successfully staged. The compositional style of these early works was conventional—the relatively more sophisticated ''Rienzi'' showing the clear influence of Meyerbeerean Grand Opera—and did not exhibit the innovations that would mark Wagner's place in musical history. Later in life, Wagner said that he did not consider these immature works to be part of his oeuvre, and none of them have ever been performed at the Wagnerian Bayreuth Festival. These works have been only rarely revived in the last hundred years, although the overture to ''Rienzi'' is an occasional concert piece.

Middle stage (184351)

Wagner's middle stage output begins to show the deepening of his powers as a dramatist and composer. This period began with ''Der fliegende Holländer'' (1843) (''The Flying Dutchman''), followed by ''Tannhäuser'' (1845) and ''Lohengrin'' (1850). These three operas reinforced the reputation among the public in Germany and beyond that Wagner had begun to establish for himself with ''Rienzi''. However, during his exile following the 1849 May Uprising in Dresden he began to reconsider his entire concept of opera and eventually decided, as explained during a series of essays between 1849 and 1852, that these operas did not represent what he hoped to achieve. In his essay ''A Communication to My Friends'' (1851), intended as a preface to the printed libretti of the ''Dutchman'', ''Tannhäuser'' and ''Lohengrin'', Wagner (to the confusion of many of his friends, since at that time ''Lohengrin'' had not even been staged) effectively disowned these operas and declared his intention to strike out in new directions.

I shall never write an ''Opera'' more. As I have no wish to invent an arbitrary title for my works, I will call them Dramas [...]

I propose to produce my myth in three complete dramas, preceded by a lengthy Prelude (Vorspiel). [...]

At a specially-appointed Festival, I propose, some future time, to produce those three Dramas with their Prelude, ''in the course of three days and a fore-evening''. The object of this production I shall consider thoroughly attained, if I and my artistic comrades, the actual performers, shall within these four evenings succeed in ''artistically conveying my purpose to the true Emotional'' (not the Critical) ''Understanding'' of spectators who shall have gathered together expressly to learn it. [...]

Wagner later reconciled himself to the works of this period, though he reworked both ''Dutchman'' and ''Tannhäuser'' on several occasions. The three operas are the earliest works included into the Bayreuth canon, the list of mature operas which Cosima put on at the Bayreuth Festival after Wagner's death in accordance with his wishes. They continue to be regularly performed today and have been frequently recorded. They show increasing mastery in stagecraft, orchestration and atmosphere.

Late stage (18511882)

Starting the ''Ring''

thumb|Brünnhilde the Valkyrie, as illustrated by Arthur Rackham (1910)|alt=A youthful valkyrie, wearing armour, cloak and winged helmet and holding a spear, stands with one foot on a rock and looks intently towards the right foreground. In the background are trees and mountains.''Main articles: Der Ring des Nibelungen, Der Ring des Nibelungen: Composition of the music and Der Ring des Nibelungen: Composition of the poem'' Wagner's late dramas are considered his masterpieces. ''Der Ring des Nibelungen'', commonly referred to as the ''Ring'' cycle, is a set of four operas based loosely on figures and elements of Germanic mythology—particularly from the later Norse mythology—notably the Old Norse ''Poetic Edda'' and ''Volsunga Saga'', and the Middle High German ''Nibelungenlied''. They were also influenced by Wagner's concepts of ancient Greek drama, in which tetralogies were a component of Athenian festivals, and which he had amply discussed in his essay "Oper und Drama"

The first two components of the ''Ring cycle'' were ''Das Rheingold'' (''The Rhinegold'') (completed 1854) and ''Die Walküre'' (''The Valkyrie'') (completed 1856). In ''Das Rheingold'', with its "relentlessly talky "realism" [and] the absence of lyrical "numbers" ", Wagner came very close to the pure musical ideals of his 184951 essays. ''Die Walküre'', with Siegmund's almost full-blown aria (''Winterstürme'') in the first act, and the quasi-choral appearance of the Valkyries themselves, shows more 'operatic' traits, but has been assessed as "the music drama that most satisfactorily embodies the theoretical principles of "Oper und Drama". A thoroughgoing synthesis of poetry and music is achieved without any notable sacrifice in musical expression".

''Tristan und Isolde'' and ''Die Meistersinger''

While still composing the ''Ring'', (leaving the third ''Ring'' opera ''Siegfried'' uncompleted for the while), Wagner paused between 1857 and 1864 to compose the tragic love story ''Tristan und Isolde'' and his only mature comedy ''Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg'' (''The Mastersingers of Nuremberg''), two works which are also part of the regular operatic canon.

''Tristan und Isolde'' uses a story line deriving from the poem ''Tristan und Isolt'' by the 13th century poet Gottfried von Strassburg. Wagner noted that "its allpervading tragedy [...] impressed me so deeply that I felt convinced it should stand out in bold relief, regardless of minor details." This impact, together with his discovery of the philosophy of Schopenhauer in October 1854, led Wagner to find himself in a "serious mood created by Schopenhauer, which was trying to find ecstatic expression. It was some such mood that inspired the conception of a Tristan und Isolde." Wagner half-parodied the powerful erotic atmosphere of the opera in a letter to Mathilde Wesendonck:

Child! This Tristan is turning into something ''terrible''. This final act!!! I fear the opera will be banned [...] only mediocre performances can save me! Perfectly good ones will be bound to drive people mad.

The work was first performed in Munich on 10 June 1865, conducted by Hans von Bülow.

Tristan is often granted a special place in musical history. It has been described as "fifty years ahead of its time" because of its chromaticism, long-held discords, unusual orchestral colouring and harmony, and use of polyphony. Wagner himself felt that his musico-dramatical theories were most perfectly realised in this work with its use of "the art of transition" between dramatic elements and the balance achieved between vocal and orchestral lines.

''Die Meistersinger'' was originally conceived by Wagner in 1845 as a sort of comic pendant to ''Tannhäuser''. It was first performed in Munich, again under the baton of Bülow, on 21 June 1868, its accessibility making it an immediate success. It is "a rich, perceptive music drama widely admired for its warm humanity"; but because of its strong German nationalist overtones, it is also held up by some as an example of Wagner's reactionary politics and antisemitism.

Completing the ''Ring''

When Wagner returned, with the added experience of composing ''Tristan'' and ''Die Meistersinger'', to write the music for the last act of ''Siegfried'' and for ''Götterdämmerung'' (''Twilight of the Gods''), as the final part of the ''Ring'' was eventually called, his style had changed once again to one more recognisable as 'operatic' (though thoroughly stamped with his own originality as a composer, and suffused with leitmotivs) than the aural world of ''Rheingold'' and ''Walküre''. This was in part because the libretti of the four 'Ring' operas had been written in reverse order, so that the book for ''Götterdämmerung'' was conceived more 'traditionally' than that of ''Rheingold''; still, the self-imposed strictures of the ''Gesamtkunstwerk'' had become relaxed. As George Bernard Shaw sardonically (and slightly unfairly) noted,

:And now, O Nibelungen Spectator, pluck up; for all allegories come to an end somewhere[...] The rest of what you are going to see is opera, and nothing but opera. Before many bars have been played, Siegfried and the wakened Brynhild, newly become tenor and soprano, will sing a concerted cadenza; plunge on from that to a magnificent love duet[...]The work which follows, entitled Night Falls On The Gods [Shaw's translation of ''Götterdämmerung''], is a thorough grand opera.

However, the differences are also because of Wagner's development as a composer during the period in which he composed ''Tristan'', ''Meistersinger'' and also the Paris version of ''Tannhäuser''. From Act III of Siegfried onwards, the ''Ring'' becomes chromatic, and both harmonically more complex and more developmental in its treatment of leitmotifs. Having taken 26 years from the first draft of a libretto in 1848 until the completion of ''Götterdämmerung'' in 1874, the ''Ring'' represents in all about 15 hours of performance, the only undertaking of such size to be regularly represented on the world's stages.

''Parsifal''

Wagner's final opera, ''Parsifal'' (1882), which was his only work written especially for his Festspielhaus in Bayreuth and which is described in the score as a "Bühnenweihfestspiel" (festival play for the consecration of the stage), has a storyline suggested by elements of the legend of the Holy Grail. It also however carries elements of Buddhist renunciation suggested by Wagner's readings of Schopenhauer. Wagner described it to Cosima as his "last card". The composer's treatment of Christianity in the opera, its eroticism, and its supposed relationship to ideas of German nationalism (and of antisemitism) have continued to render it controversial for non-musical reasons. However, musically it has been held to represent a continuing development of the composer's style , with "a diaphanous score of unearthly beauty and refinement".

Non-operatic music

Apart from his operas, Wagner composed relatively few pieces of music. These include a single symphony (written at the age of 19), a Faust Overture (the only completed part of an intended symphony on the subject), and some overtures, choral and piano pieces. His most commonly performed work not drawn from an opera is the ''Siegfried Idyll'', a piece for chamber orchestra written for the birthday of his second wife, Cosima. The ''Idyll'' draws on several motifs from the ''Ring'' cycle, though it is not part of the ''Ring''. Also performed are the ''Wesendonck Lieder'' for voice and piano, properly known as ''Five Songs for a Female Voice'', which were composed for Mathilde Wesendonck while Wagner was working on ''Tristan''. An oddity is the ''American Centennial March'' of 1876, commissioned by the city of Philadelphia (on the recommendation of conductor Theodore Thomas, who was subsequently very disappointed with the work when it arrived) for the opening of the Centennial Exposition, for which Wagner was paid $5,000.

The rarely performed ''Das Liebesmahl der Apostel'' (''The Love Feast of the Apostles'') is a piece for male choruses and orchestra, composed in 1843. Wagner, who had been elected at the beginning of the year to the committee of a cultural association in the city of Dresden, received a commission to evoke the theme of Pentecost. The premiere took place at the Dresdner Frauenkirche on 6 July 1843, and was performed by around a hundred musicians and almost 1,200 singers. The concert was very well received.

After completing ''Parsifal'', Wagner expressed an intention to turn to the writing of symphonies. However, no sketches for such works have survived, if indeed they were undertaken.

The overtures and orchestral passages from Wagner's middle and late-stage operas are commonly played as concert pieces. For most of these, Wagner wrote short passages to conclude the excerpt so that it does not end abruptly. Another familiar extract is the "Bridal Chorus" from ''Lohengrin'', frequently played as the bride's processional wedding march in English-speaking countries.

Writings

Wagner was an extremely prolific writer, authoring hundreds of books, poems, and articles, as well as voluminous correspondence, throughout his life. His writings covered a wide range of topics, including politics, philosophy, and detailed analyses of his own operas. Essays of note include "Art and Revolution" (1849), "Opera and Drama" (1851), an essay on the theory of opera, and "Das Judenthum in der Musik" ("Jewishness in Music", 1850), a polemic directed against Jewish composers in general, and Giacomo Meyerbeer in particular. He also wrote various autobiographical works, including "My Life" (1880). In his later years Wagner became a vociferous opponent of experimentation on animals and in 1879 he published an open letter, "Against Vivisection", in support of the animal rights activist Ernst von Weber.

There have been several editions of Wagner's writings, including a centennial edition in German edited by Dieter Borchmeyer (which however omitted the essay "Das Judenthum in der Musik") The English translations of Wagner's prose in 8 volumes by W. Ashton Ellis, (189299), are still in print and commonly used, despite their deficiencies. A complete edition of Wagner's correspondence, (estimated to amount to between 10,000 and 12,000 surviving items), of which the first volume appeared in 1967, is still under way.

Influence and legacy

Influence on music

Wagner's later musical style, with its unprecedented exploration of emotional expression, introduced new ideas in harmony, melodic process (leitmotiv) and operatic structure. Notably from ''Tristan und Isolde'' onwards, he explored the limits of the traditional tonal system that gave keys and chords their identity, pointing the way to atonality in the 20th century. Some music historians date the beginning of modern classical music to the first notes of ''Tristan'', the so-called Tristan chord.

In his lifetime, and for some years after, Wagner inspired fanatical devotion. For a long period, many composers were inclined to align themselves with or against Wagner's music. Anton Bruckner and Hugo Wolf were indebted to him especially, as were César Franck, Henri Duparc, Ernest Chausson, Jules Massenet, Alexander von Zemlinsky, Hans Pfitzner and dozens of others. Gustav Mahler said, "There was only Beethoven and Richard [Wagner] and after them, nobody". The twentieth century harmonic revolutions of Claude Debussy and Arnold Schoenberg (tonal and atonal modernism, respectively) have often been traced back to ''Tristan'' and ''Parsifal''. The Italian form of operatic realism known as verismo owed much to Wagnerian reconstruction of musical form.

Wagner made a major contribution to the principles and practice of conducting. His essay "About Conducting" (1869) advanced the earlier work of Hector Berlioz and proposed that conducting was a means by which a musical work could be re-interpreted, rather than simply a mechanism for achieving orchestral unison. He exemplified this approach in his own conducting, which was significantly more flexible than the disciplined approach of Mendelssohn; in his view this also justified practices which would today be frowned upon, such as the rewriting of scores. Wilhelm Furtwängler felt that Wagner and von Bülow, through their interpretative approach, inspired a whole new generation of conductors (including Furtwängler himself).

Influence on literature, philosophy and the visual arts

Wagner's influence on literature and philosophy is significant.

[Wagner's] protean abundance meant that he could inspire the use of literary motif in many a novel employing interior monologue; [...] the Symbolists saw him as a mystic hierophant; the Decadents found many a frisson in his work.

Friedrich Nietzsche was part of Wagner's inner circle during the early 1870s, and his first published work ''The Birth of Tragedy'' proposed Wagner's music as the Dionysian rebirth of European culture in opposition to Apollonian rationalist decadence. Nietzsche broke with Wagner following the first Bayreuth Festival, believing that Wagner's final phase represented a pandering to Christian pieties and a surrender to the new German Reich. Nietzsche expressed his displeasure with the later Wagner in "The Case of Wagner" and "Nietzsche contra Wagner".

Charles Baudelaire, Stéphane Mallarmé and Paul Verlaine worshipped Wagner. Edouard Dujardin, whose influential novel ''Les lauriers sont coupés'' is in the form of an interior monologue inspired by Wagnerian music, founded a journal dedicated to Wagner, ''La Revue Wagnérienne'', to which J. K. Huysmans and Téodor de Wyzewa contributed.

In the twentieth century, W. H. Auden once called Wagner "perhaps the greatest genius that ever lived", while Thomas Mann and Marcel Proust were heavily influenced by him and discussed Wagner in their novels. He is discussed in some of the works of James Joyce. Wagnerian themes inhabit T. S. Eliot's ''The Waste Land'', which contains lines from ''Tristan und Isolde'' and ''Götterdämmerung'' and Verlaine's poem on ''Parsifal''. Many of the Wagner's concepts, including his speculation about dreams, predated their investigation by Sigmund Freud. In a long list of other major cultural figures influenced by Wagner, Bryan Magee includes D. H. Lawrence, Aubrey Beardsley, Romain Rolland, Gérard de Nerval, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Rainer Maria Rilke and numerous others.

Opponents and supporters

Not all reaction to Wagner was positive. For a time, German musical life divided into two factions, Wagner's supporters and those of Johannes Brahms; the latter, with the support of the powerful critic Eduard Hanslick (of whom Beckmesser in ''Meistersinger'' is in part a caricature) championed traditional forms and led the conservative front against Wagnerian innovations. They were supported by the conservative leanings of some German music schools, including the Conservatory at Leipzig under Ignaz Moscheles and that at Cologne under the direction of Ferdinand Hiller. Even those who, like Debussy, opposed him ("that old poisoner") could not deny Wagner's influence. Indeed, Debussy was one of many composers, including Tchaikovsky, who felt the need to break with Wagner precisely because his influence was so unmistakable and overwhelming. 'Golliwogg's Cakewalk' from Debussy's ''Children's Corner'' piano suite contains a deliberately tongue-in-cheek quotation from the opening bars of ''Tristan''. Others who resisted Wagner's attraction included Gioachino Rossini ("Wagner has wonderful moments, and dreadful quarters of an hour"). In the 20th century Wagner's music was parodied by, amongst others Paul Hindemith and Hans Eisler.

Wagner's followers (known as Wagnerians or Wagnerites) have formed many Societies dedicated to the life, works, and operas of Wagner. Societies include: The Toronto Wagner Society, the Wagner Society of New York, the Wagner Society of the United Kingdom, The Wagner Society of New Zealand, The Wagner Society of Northern California, etc.

Theatre design and practice

Wagner was responsible for several theatrical innovations developed at the Bayreuth Festspielhaus (for the design of which he appropriated some of the ideas of his former colleague, Gottfried Semper, which he had solicited for a proposed new opera house at Munich). These innovations include darkening the auditorium during performances, and placing the orchestra in a pit out of view of the audience. Adolphe Appia's stagings of Wagner operas at Bayreuth had far reaching consequences in theatre practice generally.

Influence on film

Wagner's concept of the use of leitmotifs and integrated musical expression has been an influence on many 20th and 21st century film scores. The critic Theodor Adorno has noted that the Wagnerian leitmotiv "leads directly to cinema music where the sole function of the leitmotiv is to announce heroes or situations so as to allow the audience to orient itself more easily". Some film scores have used Wagnerian themes (e.g. Francis Ford Coppola's ''Apocalypse Now'' which features a version of the ''Ride of the Valkyrie''). Most of Trevor Jones's soundtrack to John Boorman's Arthurian film ''Excalibur'' is from Wagner's operas.

Wagner has also been the subject of many biographical films. (See article List of films about Richard Wagner).

Influence on popular music

The rock composer Jim Steinman created what he called Wagnerian Rock. Heavy metal music is also said by some to show the influence of Wagner (as well as other classical composers). Joey DeMaio of Manowar called Wagner the 'Grandfather of Heavy Metal'. In Germany Rammstein and Joachim Witt who has named three of his albums ''Bayreuth'', claim inspiration from Wagner's music. German electronic composer Klaus Schulze dedicated his 1975 album ''Timewind'' to Wagner's death (two 30-min tracks, "Bayreuth Return" and "Wahnfried 1883"). He also used the alias Richard Wahnfried for a part of his discography. Slovenian avant-garde group Laibach created the sonic suite ''VolksWagner'' in 2009 in collaboration with the Slovenian Radio Symphony Orchestra and composer-conductor Izidor Leitinger, using material from ''Tannhäuser'', the ''Siegfried Idyll'' and ''The Ride of the Valkyries''. Phil Spector's wall of sound recording technique was heavily influenced by Wagner.

Controversies

Wagner's operas, writings, his politics, beliefs and unorthodox lifestyle made him a controversial figure during his lifetime. Following Wagner's death, the debate about his ideas and their interpretation, particularly in Germany during the 20th century, continued to make him politically and socially controversial in a way that other great composers are not. Much heat is generated by Wagner's comments on Jews, which continue to influence the way that his works are regarded, and by the essays he wrote on the nature of race from 1850 onwards, and their putative influence on the antisemitism of Adolf Hitler.

Racism and antisemitism

Wagner's writings on race and his antisemitism reflected some trends of thought in Germany during the 19th century.

Under a pseudonym in the ''Neue Zeitschrift für Musik'', Wagner published the essay "Das Judenthum in der Musik" in 1850 (originally translated as "Judaism in Music", by which name it is still known, but better rendered as "Jewishness in Music.") The essay attacked Jewish contemporaries (and rivals) Felix Mendelssohn and Giacomo Meyerbeer, and accused Jews of being a harmful and alien element in German culture. Wagner stated the German people were repelled by Jews' alien appearance and behaviour: "with all our speaking and writing in favour of the Jews' emancipation, we always felt instinctively repelled by any actual, operative contact with them." He argued that because Jews had no connection to the German spirit, Jewish musicians were only capable of producing shallow and artificial music. They therefore composed music to achieve popularity and, thereby, financial success, as opposed to creating genuine works of art. Wagner republished the pamphlet under his own name in 1869, with an extended introduction, leading to several public protests at the first performances of ''Die Meistersinger''. He repeated similar views in later articles, such as "What is German?" (1878, but based on a draft written in the 1860s).

Some biographers have suggested that antisemitic stereotypes are also represented in Wagner's operas. The characters of Mime in the ''Ring'', Sixtus Beckmesser in ''Die Meistersinger,'' and Klingsor in ''Parsifal'' are sometimes claimed as Jewish representations, though they are not explicitly identified as such in the libretto. Moreover, in all of Wagner's many writings about his works, there is no mention of an intention to caricature Jews in his operas; nor does any such notion appear in the diaries written by Cosima Wagner, which record his views on a daily basis over a period of eight years.

Despite his very public views on Jews, throughout his life Wagner had Jewish friends, colleagues and supporters. In his autobiography, ''Mein Leben'', Wagner mentions many friendships with Jews, referring to that with Samuel Lehrs in Paris as "one of the most beautiful friendships of my life."

The topic of Wagner and the Jews is further complicated by allegations, which may have been credited by Wagner himself, that he himself was of Jewish ancestry, via his supposed father Geyer. In reality, Geyer was not of Jewish descent, nor were either of Wagner's official parents. References to Wagner's supposed 'Jewishness' were made frequently in cartoons of the composer in the 1870s and 1880s, and more explicitly by Friedrich Nietzsche in his essay "The Wagner Case", where he wrote "a Geyer (vulture) is almost an Adler (eagle)". (Both 'Geyer' and 'Adler' were common Jewish surnames.)

Some biographers have asserted that Wagner in his final years came to believe in the racialist philosophy of Arthur de Gobineau, and according to Robert Gutman, this is reflected in the opera ''Parsifal''. Other biographers such as Lucy Beckett believe that this is not true. Wagner showed no significant interest in Gobineau until 1880, when he read Gobineau's "An Essay on the Inequality of the Human Races". Wagner had completed the libretto for ''Parsifal'' by 1877, and the original drafts of the story date back to 1857. Wagner's writings of his last years indicate some interest in Gobineau's idea that Western society was doomed because of miscegenation between "superior" and "inferior" races.

Other interpretations

Wagner's ideas were amenable to socialist interpretations, which is not surprising given the composer's revolutionary inclinations in the 1840s, when many of his ideas on art were being formulated. Thus for example, George Bernard Shaw wrote in ''The Perfect Wagnerite'' (1883):

[Wagner's] picture of Niblunghome [Shaw's anglicization of ''Nibelheim'', the empire of Alberich in the ''Ring Cycle''] under the reign of Alberic is a poetic vision of unregulated industrial capitalism as it was made known in Germany in the middle of the nineteenth century by Engels's ''Condition of the Laboring Classes in England''

Left-wing interpretations of Wagner also inform the writings of Theodor Adorno amongst other Wagner critics. Walter Benjamin gave Wagner as an example of "bourgeois false consciousness", alienating art from its social context.

The writer Robert Donington has produced a detailed, if controversial, Jungian interpretation of the ''Ring cycle''. Others have also applied psychoanalytical techniques to Wagner's life and works.

Nazi appropriation

Adolf Hitler was an admirer of Wagner's music and saw in his operas an embodiment of his own vision of the German nation. There continues to be debate about the extent to which Wagner's views might have influenced Nazi thinking. The Nazis used those parts of Wagner's thought that were useful for propaganda and ignored or suppressed the rest. Although Hitler himself was an ardent fan of "the Master", many in the Nazi hierarchy were not and, according to the historian Richard Carr, resented attending these lengthy epics at Hitler's insistence.

There is evidence that music of Wagner was used at the Dachau concentration camp in 1933/4 to 'reeducate' political prisoners by exposure to 'national music'. However there seems to be no evidence to support claims, sometimes made, that his music was played at Nazi death camps during the Second World War.

Because of the associations of Wagner with antisemitism and Nazism, the performance of his music in the State of Israel has been a source of controversy. Breaking with tradition Wagner will be played at the Bayreuth's Wagner festival. Israeli music director Roberto Paternostro decided to break this taboo and "to divide the man from his art."

References

;Notes

Sources and further reading

Prose works by Wagner

Wagner, Richard, (ed. Dieter Borchmeyer) (1983) ''Richard Wagner Dichtungen und Schriften'', 10 vols. Frankfurt am Main.

Wagner, Richard (ed. and trans. Stewart Spencer and Barry Millington) (1987) ''Selected Letters of Richard Wagner'', Dent. ISBN 0460046438; W. W. Norton and Company ISBN 978-0393025002.

Wagner, Richard (trans. Andrew Gray) (1992) ''My Life'', Da Capo Press. ISBN 978-0306804816 Wagner's sometimes unreliable autobiography, covering his life to 1864, written between 1865 and 1880 and first published privately in German in a small edition between 1870 and 1880. The first (edited) public edition appeared in 1911. Gray's translation is the most comprehensive available.

Wagner, Richard: Collected Prose Works. tr. W. Ashton Ellis

::Wagner, Richard (1994c) Vol. 1 ''The Artwork of the Future and Other Works'', University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln and London. ISBN 9780803297524 ::Wagner, Richard (1995d) Vol. 2 ''Opera and Drama'', University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln and London. 1995. ISBN 0803297653 ::Wagner, Richard (1995c) Vol. 3 ''Judaism in Music and Other Essays'', University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln and London. ISBN 9780803297661 ::Wagner, Richard (1995a) Vol. 4 ''Art and Politics'', University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln and London. ISBN 9780803297746 ::Wagner, Richard (1995b) Vol. 5 ''Actors and Singers'', University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln and London. ISBN 9780803297739 ::Wagner, Richard (1994a) Vol. 6 ''Religion and Art'' , University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln and London. ISBN 9780803297645 ::Wagner, Richard (1994b) Vol. 7 ''Pilgrimage to Beethoven and Other Essays'', University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln and London. ISBN 9780803297630 ::Wagner, Richard (1995c) Vol. 8 ''Jesus of Nazareth and Other Writings'', University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln and London. ISBN 9780803297807

Other sources

Adorno, Theodor (trans. Rodney Livingstone) (2009) ''In Search of Wagner'' Verso Books, London. ISBN 9781844673445

Ashman, Mike (1982) "''Tannhäuser'' – an obsession" in: John, Nicholas (Series Editor) ''English National Opera/The Royal Opera House Opera Guide 12: Der Fliegende Holländer/The Flying Dutchman'', London, John Calder, ISBN 0714539201. pp. 7–15.

Beckett, Lucy (1981) ''Richard Wagner: Parsifal'', Cambridge University Press.

Borchmeyer, Dieter (2003) "Drama and the World of Richard Wagner", Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0691114972

Bruen, Hanan (1993) ''Wagner in Israel: A conflict among Aesthetic, Historical, Psychological and Social Considerations'', Journal of Aesthetic Education, vol. 27 no. 1 (Spring 1993), pp. 99–103

Burbidge, Peter and Sutton, Richard (eds.) (1979) "The Wagner Companion", Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0521296571

Dahlhaus, Carl (trans. Mary Whittall) (1979) ''Richard Wagner's Music Dramas'', Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0521223973

Conway, David (2002) "'A Vulture is Almost an Eagle'......The Jewishness of Richard Wagner", ''Jewry in Music'', accessed 23 July 2010.

Dallas, Ian (1990) ''The New Wagnerian'', Freiburg Books. ISBN 978-8440474759

Daverio, John (2008) ''Tristan und Isolde: essence and appearance'', in Grey (2008) 115133

Deathridge, John (1982) "An Introduction to ''The Flying Dutchman''" in John, Nicholas (Series Editor) ''English National Opera/The Royal Opera House Opera Guide 12: Der Fliegende Holländer/The Flying Dutchman'', London, John Calder, ISBN 0714539201 pp. 13–26.

Deathridge, John (2008) ''Wagner Beyond Good and Evil'', Berkeley ISBN 9780520254534

Donnington, Robert (1979) ''Wagner's 'Ring' and its Symbols'' Faber Paperbacks London ISBN 0571 04818 8

Everett, Derrick (2008) "Wagner, Gobineau and ''Parsifal'': Gobineau as the inspiration for ''Parsifal''", ''http://www.monsalvat.no'', version of 26 June 2008, accessed 27 July 2010.

Fackler, Guido (tr. Peter Logan) (2007) "Music in Concentration Camps 1933–1945", ''Music and Politics'', Volume I, Number 1, (Winter 2007).

Grant, John (1999) "Excalibur: US movie" in John Clute & John Grant (Eds.) ''The Encyclopedia of Fantasy'', Orbit p. 324. ISBN 1-85723-893-1

Gregor-Dellin, Martin (1983) ''Richard Wagner — His Life, His Work, His Century'', Harcourt. ISBN 978-0151771516

Grey, Thomas S. (ed.) (2008) ''The Cambridge Companion to Wagner'', Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0521644396

Gutman, Robert W. (1990) ''Wagner — The Man, His Mind and His Music'', Harvest Books. ISBN 978-0156776158

Higgins, Charlotte (2007) How the Nazis took flight from Valkyries and Rhinemaidens, ''The Guardian'', 3 July 2007, accessed 28 December 2008.

Horton, Paul C. (1999) Review of ''Psychoanalytic Explorations in Music: Second Series'' ed. Stuart Feder, American Journal of Psychiatry vol. 156 pp. 1109–1110, July 1999, consulted July 8, 2010

John, Eckhardt (2004) ''La musique dans la système concentrationnaire nazi'', in ''Le troisième Reich et al. Musique'', ed. Pascal Huynh, Paris ISBN 2213621357

Katz, Jacob (1986) ''The Darker Side of Genius: Richard Wagner's Anti-Semitism'', Hanover and London. ISBN 0874513685

Kennedy, Michael (1980) ''The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Music'', Oxford ISBN 9780193113206

Kershaw, Ian (1999) ''Hitler 18891936: Hubris'', Penguin. ISBN 0140288988

Laibach (undated) "Laibach presents VolksWagner", www.laibach.nsk.si. (Accessed 23 July 2010)

Lee, M. Owen (1998) ''Wagner: The Terrible Man and His Truthful Art'', University of Toronto Press. ISBN 978-0802047212

Magee, Bryan (2001) ''The Tristan Chord: Wagner and Philosophy'', Metropolitan Books. ISBN 978-0805071894

Magee, Bryan (1988) ''Aspects of Wagner'', Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0192840127

Magic Circle Music (undated) "Artist biography: Manowar", maciccirclemusic.com, accessed 23 July 2010.

May, Thomas (2004) ''Decoding Wagner'', Amadeus Press. ISBN 978-1574670974

Martin, T. P. (1992) ''Joyce and Wagner: A Study in Influence'', Cambridge , 1992. ISBN 978-0521394871

McClatchie, Stephen (2008) ''Performing Germany in Wagner's 'Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg' '',in Grwy (2008) pp. 134–150

Millington, Barry (Ed.) (1992) ''The Wagner Compendium: A Guide to Wagner's Life and Music''. Thames and Hudson Ltd., London. ISBN 0028713591

Millington, Barry (2008) ''Der Ring des Nibelungen: conception and interpretation'' in Grey (2008), 7484

Millington, Barry (undated a) "Wesendonck, Mathilde" in ''Grove Music Online''. Oxford Music Online. (Subscription only, accessed July 20, 2010).

Millington, Barry (undated b) "Walküre, Die." In ''The New Grove Dictionary of Opera'', edited by Stanley Sadie. ''Grove Music Online''. Oxford Music Online, http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/subscriber/article/grove/music/O003661 (Subscription only, accessed July 23, 2010).

Millington, Barry (undated c) "Meistersinger von Nürnberg, Die." In ''The New Grove Dictionary of Opera'', edited by Stanley Sadie. ''Grove Music Online''. Oxford Music Online, http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/subscriber/article/grove/music/O003512 (Subscription only, accessed July 23, 2010).

Millington, Barry (undated d) "Parsifal." In ''The New Grove Dictionary of Opera'', edited by Stanley Sadie. ''Grove Music Online''. Oxford Music Online, http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/subscriber/article/grove/music/O002803 (Subscription only, accessed July 23, 2010).

Newman, Ernest (1933) ''The Life of Richard Wagner'', 4 vols. ISBN 978-0685148242 (the classic biography, superseded by newer research but still full of many valuable insights)

Nicholson, Christopher (2007) "Richard and Adolf: Did Richard Wagner incite Adolf Hitler to commit the Holocaust?", Gefen Publishing House. ISBN 978-9652293602

Nietzsche, Friedrich (trans. Walter Kaufmann) (1967) ''The Case of Wagner'' in Nietsche (trans. Kaufmann) ''The Birth of Tragedy'' and ''The Case of Wagner'', Random House. ISBN 394 70369-3.

Overvold, Liselotte Z. (1976) ''Wagner's American Centennial March: Genesis and Reception'', Monatshefte (Univ.of Wisconsin),Vol.68 no.2 (Summer 1976), pp. 179–187

Painter, George D. (1983) ''Marcel Proust''. Penguin, Harmondsworth ISBN0140065121

Potter, Pamela R. (2008) ''Wagner and the Third Reich: myths and realities'', in ''The Cambridge Companion to Wagner'', ed. Thomas S. Grey, Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0521644396

Puffett, Derrick (1984) "''Siegfried'' in the Context of Wagner's Operatic Writing", in ''Siegfried: Opera Guide 28'' series ed. Nicholas John, John Calder (Publishers) Ltd. ISBN 0 7145 4040 4

Rose, John Luke (1981) "A Landmark in Musical History" in Nicholas John (series ed.) ''Tristan and Isolde: English National Opera Guide 6'', John Calder Publisher's Ltd. ISBN 0 7145 3849 3

Rose, Paul Lawrence (1996) ''Wagner:Race and Revolution'', London ISBN 057117888X

Ross, Alex (1998) ''The Unforgiven: Wagner and Hitler"'' in ''The New Yorker'', 10 August 1998. Copy on author's website used. Link accessed 10 July 2010.

Runciman, J.F. (1913) ''Wagner'', Project Gutenberg edition. here .

Salmi, Hannu (2005) ''Wagner and Wagnerism in Nineteenth-Century Sweden, Finland, and the Baltic Provinces: Reception, Enthusiasm, Cult'', Eastman Studies in Music. University of Rochester Press. ISBN 978-1580462075

Salmi, Hannu (2000) ''Imagined Germany. Richard Wagner's National Utopia'', Peter Lang Publishing. ISBN 978-0820444161

Scruton, Roger (2003) ''Death-Devoted Heart: Sex and the Sacred in Wagner's 'Tristan and Isolde''', Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780195166910

Shaw, George Bernard (1898) ''The Perfect Wagnerite''. Online version at http://www.gutenberg.org/files/1487/1487-h/1487-h.htm#2H_4_0011 accessed 20 July 2010.

Sietz, Reinhold and Wiegandt, Matthias (undated) "Hiller, Ferdinand." In ''Grove Music Online''. Oxford Music Online, http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/subscriber/article/grove/music/13041 (Subscription only, accessed July 23, 2010).

Skelton, Geoffrey (2002) "Bayreuth" in ''Grove Music Online'', Oxford Music Online. Version dated 28 February 2002, accessed 20 December 2009.

Spencer, Stewart (2000) ''Wagner Remembered'', Faber and Faber. ISBN 978-0571196531

Spiro, Jonathan Peter (2008) ''Defending the master race: conservation, eugenics, and the legacy of Madison Grant'', UPNE. ISBN 978 1 58465 715 5.

Spotts, Frederic (1994) ''Bayreuth: A History of the Wagner Festival'', New Haven and London ISBN 9780300066654

Tanner, M. (1995) ''Wagner'', Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0691102900

Treadwell, James (2008) ''The Urge to Communicate''in Grey (2008), pp. 179–191

von Westernhagen, Kurt (1980) ''(Wilhelm) Richard Wagner'' in vol. 20 of Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, ed. S. Sadie, London 1980

Wagner, Cosima (trans. Geoffrey Skelton) (1978) ''Diaries'', 2 vols. ISBN 978-0151226351

Walker, Alan (1996) ''Franz Liszt: The Final Years'', New York. ISBN 9780394525426

Walsh, Michael (1992) ''The Case of Wagner Again'', Time, January 13, 1992, consulted online 17.7.2010

Wapnewski, Peter (1992) ''Wagner's Musical Influence'', in ''The Wagner Handbook''

Weiner, Marc A. (1997) ''Richard Wagner and the Anti-Semitic Imagination'', Lincoln and London. ISBN 9780803297920

Westrup, Jack (1980) ''Conducting'' , in vol. 4 of Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, ed. S. Sadie, London 1980

Žižek, Slavoj (2009) "Foreword: Why is Wagner Worth Saving" in Adorno (2009) viiixxvii.

External links

;Operas

Richard Wagner Opera, Richard Wagner operas, Wagner interviews, CDs, DVDs, Wagner calendar, Bayreuth Festival

Wagner Operas, site featuring photographs, video, MIDI files, scores, libretti, and commentary

RWagner.net, contains libretti of his operas, with English translations

Wagner website, assortment of articles on Wagner and his operas

Photo of Wagner's manuscript for the Bridal Chorus

''The Wagnerian Romances'' by Gertrude Hall

;Writings

The Wagner Library. English translations of Wagner's prose works, including some of Wagner's more notable essays.

;Pictures

The Richard Wagner Postcard-Gallery, a gallery of historic postcards with motives from Richard Wagner's operas.

gallica.bnf.fr Pictures of Richard Wagner and his family.

;Scores

;Other

BBC audio file. Discussion of Wagner on Radio 4 programme ''In our time''.

Bayreuth Festival

The National Archive of the Richard Wagner Foundation

The humanities.music.composers.wagner FAQ.

Richard Wagner Museum in the country manor Triebschen beside Lucerne, Switzerland where he and Cosima lived and worked from 1866 to 1872.

The Wagner Tuba

Category:1813 births Category:1883 deaths Category:19th-century German people Category:Deaths from myocardial infarction Category:German composers Category:German conductors (music) Category:German Lutherans Category:German music critics Category:German theatre directors Category:German writers Category:German autobiographers Category:Honorary Members of the Royal Philharmonic Society Category:Antisemitism Category:Music from Leipzig Category:Opera composers Category:German opera librettists Category:Opera managers Category:People from Leipzig Category:People of the Revolutions of 1848 Category:Romantic composers Category:Romanticism Category:University of Leipzig alumni Richard Category:Walhalla enshrinees Category:19th-century theatre Category:Members of the Bavarian Maximilian Order for Science and Art

af:Richard Wagner als:Richard Wagner ab:Рихард Вагнер ar:ريتشارد فاغنر an:Richard Wagner az:Rixard Vaqner bn:রিশার্ড ভাগনার zh-min-nan:Richard Wagner map-bms:Richard Wagner be:Вільгельм Рыхард Вагнер be-x-old:Рыхард Вагнэр bar:Richard Wagner bs:Richard Wagner br:Richard Wagner bg:Рихард Вагнер ca:Richard Wagner cv:Рихăрт Вакнĕр cs:Richard Wagner cy:Richard Wagner da:Richard Wagner de:Richard Wagner et:Richard Wagner el:Ρίχαρντ Βάγκνερ es:Richard Wagner eo:Richard Wagner ext:Richard Wagner eu:Richard Wagner fa:ریشارد واگنر hif:Richard Wagner fr:Richard Wagner fy:Richard Wagner fur:Richard Wagner ga:Richard Wagner gv:Richard Wagner gd:Richard Wagner gl:Richard Wagner gan:華格納 xal:Вагнер, Рихард ko:리하르트 바그너 hy:Ռիխարդ Վագներ hr:Richard Wagner id:Richard Wagner os:Вагнер, Рихард is:Richard Wagner it:Richard Wagner he:ריכרד וגנר jv:Richard Wagner pam:Richard Wagner ka:რიხარდ ვაგნერი kk:Вагнер, Рихард ky:Вагнер, Рихард sw:Richard Wagner la:Ricardus Wagner lv:Rihards Vāgners lb:Richard Wagner lt:Richard Wagner lij:Richard Wagner li:Richard Wagner hu:Richard Wagner mk:Рихард Вагнер ml:റിച്ചാർഡ് വാഗ്നർ mr:रिचर्ड वॅग्नर arz:ريتشارد فاجنر ms:Richard Wagner mn:Рихард Вагнер nah:Richard Wagner nl:Richard Wagner ja:リヒャルト・ワーグナー no:Richard Wagner nn:Richard Wagner oc:Richard Wagner uz:Richard Wagner pnb:رچرڈ ویگنر pms:Richard Wagner pl:Richard Wagner pt:Richard Wagner ro:Richard Wagner qu:Richard Wagner rue:Ріхард Ваґнер ru:Вагнер, Рихард sc:Richard Wagner sco:Richard Wagner sq:Richard Wagner simple:Richard Wagner sk:Richard Wagner sl:Richard Wagner ckb:ڕیچارد ڤاگنەر sr:Рихард Вагнер sh:Richard Wagner fi:Richard Wagner sv:Richard Wagner tl:Richard Wagner ta:ரிச்சார்ட் வாக்னர் tt:Рихард Вагнер th:ริชาร์ด วากเนอร์ tr:Richard Wagner uk:Ріхард Вагнер ur:رچرڈ واگنر vec:Richard Wagner vi:Richard Wagner vo:Richard Wagner war:Richard Wagner yi:ריכארד וואגנער yo:Richard Wagner zh-yue:華格納 bat-smg:Richard Wagner zh:理查德·瓦格纳

right|thumb|Nilsson in 1948. Birgit Nilsson (17 May 1918 – 25 December 2005) was a celebrated Swedish dramatic soprano who specialized in operatic and symphonic works. Her voice was noted for its overwhelming force, bountiful reserves of power and the gleaming brilliance and clarity in the upper register.

Overview

Birgit Nilsson came from a rural background and had to work hard to gain acceptance in the world of music, but she made so strong an imprint on many roles that they came to be known as the "Nilsson repertory". She sang the operas of Richard Strauss and made a specialty of Puccini's "Turandot", but it was the music of Wagner that made her career; her command of his music was comparable to that of Kirsten Flagstad, who owned the Wagner repertory at the Metropolitan Opera during the years before World War II. At her peak, Nilsson astounded audiences in live performance with the unforced power of her voice, which cut through dense orchestration, and with her remarkable breath control, which allowed her to hold notes for a remarkably long time. Her interpretive powers grew as her career developed, and she became a moving artist as well as a vocal phenomenon. Among colleagues, she also became renowned for her playful sense of humor.

Biography

Early life

Born Birgit Märta Svensson, Nilsson was the only child of Nils Peter and Justine (Paulsson) Svensson on a farm at Västra Karup in Skåne (100 km/60 miles north of Malmö).

When she was three years old she began picking out melodies on a toy piano her mother bought for her. She once told an interviewer that she could sing before she could walk, adding "I even sang in my dreams". Her vocal talent was first noticed when she began to sing in her church choir. A choirmaster near her home heard her sing and advised her to take voice lessons.

She studied with Ragnar Blennow, in Båstad, and in 1941, with Joseph Hislop and Arne Sunnegard at the Royal Academy of Music in Stockholm. However, she considered herself self-taught: "The best teacher is the stage", she told an interviewer in 1981. "You walk out onto it, and you have to learn to project." She deplored her early instruction and attributed her success to native talent. "My first voice teacher almost killed me", she said. "The second was almost as bad."

Early career

In 1946, Nilsson made her debut at the Royal Opera in Stockholm with only three days' notice, replacing the ailing Agathe in Carl Maria von Weber's ''Der Freischütz''. Conductor Leo Blech wasn't very kind to her and, as she wrote in her autobiography, she even contemplated suicide after the performance.

In 1947 she claimed national attention as Verdi's ''Lady Macbeth'' under Fritz Busch. A wealth of parts followed, from Strauss and Verdi to Wagner, Puccini, and Tchaikovsky. In Stockholm she built up a steady repertoire of roles in the lyric-dramatic field, including Donna Anna, Aïda, Lisa, Tosca, Venus, Sieglinde, Senta and the Marschallin, one of her favourite roles (though she later lamented that nobody ever asked her to undertake it), all sung in Swedish.

International engagements

Under Fritz Busch's tutelage her career took wing. He was instrumental in securing her first important engagement outside Sweden, as Elettra in Mozart's ''Idomeneo'' at the Glyndebourne Festival in 1951. Her debut at the Vienna State Opera in 1953 was a turning point; she would be a regular performer there for more than 25 years. It was followed by Elsa in Wagner's ''Lohengrin'' at the Bayreuth Festival in 1954, then her first Brünnhilde in a complete ''Ring'' at the Bavarian State Opera, at the Munich Festival of 1954. Later she returned as Sieglinde, Brünnhilde, and Isolde until 1969, all to universal acclaim.

She took the title role of ''Turandot'', which is brief but requires an unusually big sound, to La Scala in Milan in 1958, and then to the rest of Italy. Nilsson made her American debut as Brünnhilde in Wagner's ''Die Walküre'' in 1956 with the San Francisco Opera. She attained international stardom after a performance as Isolde at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City in 1959, which made front page news. She said that the single biggest event in her life was being asked to perform at the opening of the 181st season at La Scala as Turandot in 1958. She became the second non-Italian (after Maria Callas) ever granted the privilege of opening a season at La Scala. She performed at many major opera houses in the world including Vienna, Berlin, the Royal Opera House at Covent Garden, Tokyo, Paris, Buenos Aires, Chicago, and Hamburg.

She sang under Charles Mackerras with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra in the all-Wagner concert that opened the Concert Hall of the Sydney Opera House, in the presence of Queen Elizabeth II in 1973. You can listen to the concert on australianscreen online. She also gave the first lieder recital at the Opera House, accompanied by Geoffrey Parsons.

From the 1960s through to the 1980s

Nilsson was widely known as the leading Wagnerian soprano of her time, the successor to the great Norwegian soprano Kirsten Flagstad, particularly in the role of Brünnhilde. However, she also sang many of the other famous soprano roles, among them Leonore, Aida, Turandot, Tosca, Elektra, and Salome. She had, according to ''The New York Times'', a "voice of impeccable trueness and impregnable stamina". Her career was long and distinguished and continued into the 1980s, when she mostly sang Elektra and the Dyer's Wife.

Nilsson was suspicious of opera's recent youth culture and often remarked on the premature destruction of young voices brought on by overambitious career planning. "Directors and managers don't care about their futures", she once said. "They will just get another young person when this one goes bad." In today's opera culture, the best managed voices tend to mature in the singer's 40s and begin to deteriorate during the 50s. Yet at 61, when most singers hang onto whatever career remains through less taxing recitals with piano and discreet downward transpositions of key, Nilsson sang a New York concert performance of Strauss and Wagner that met both composers head on. "Ms. Nilsson did not sound young", Will Crutchfield once wrote in ''The New York Times''. "Soft and low notes were often precarious; sustained tones were not always steady." He continued: "The wonderful thing is that she doesn't let this bother her. There was never a sense of distress or worry."

The conductor Erich Leinsdorf thought that her longevity, like Flagstad's, had something to do with her Scandinavian heritage, remarking that Wagner required "thoughtful, patient and methodical people." Nilsson attributed her long career to no particular lifestyle or regimen. "I do nothing special", she once said. "I don't smoke. I drink a little wine and beer. I was born with the right set of parents." In sheer power, her high notes were sometimes compared to those of the Broadway belter Ethel Merman. One high C rendered in a "Turandot" performance in the outdoor Arena di Verona in Italy led citizenry beyond the walls to think that a fire alarm had been set off. Once urged to follow Nilsson in the same role at the Metropolitan Opera, the eminent soprano Leonie Rysanek refused.

Twice at the Met, Nilsson sustained injuries that kept her from performing. In February 1971, she sprained her ankle during a performance of "Elektra" that resulted in cancellation of one performance (that was substituted by a historical performance of ''Fidelio'' starring Christa Ludwig). Nilsson recovered to sing the broadcast performance of ''Elektra'' on 27 February. More seriously, in March 1974 she fell and dislocated her shoulder during a rehearsal of ''Götterdämmerung''. Although able to sing Brünnhilde for the first two performances with her arm in a sling, her injury caused her to miss subsequent performances, including that season's ''Götterdämmerung'' broadcast. ''The New York Times''' review of the production's March 8 opening night is reprinted in the Metropolitan Opera Archives.

"Miss N."

Beginning at the summer of 1968 at the Bayreuth Festival, Nilsson was obsessively stalked by actress and model Nell Theobald until Theobald's tragic suicide nine years later in 1977. Nilsson recounted her experiences with Theobald at length in her memoir ''La Nilsson'' where she referred to Theobald solely as "Miss N.". The stalking incident was later featured in ''Opera News'' magazine and ''The New York Times''.

Nilsson's humour

Nilsson was known for her witty one-liners:

When asked what was the most important requirement for a soprano to sing Isolde, she said, "a comfortable pair of shoes."

When asked if she thought Joan Sutherland's famous bouffant hairdo was real, she answered: "I don't know. I haven't pulled it yet."

Nilsson called Turandot, one of the most punishing roles in the soprano repertory, her "vacation role."

Rudolf Bing made a ritual joke of getting on his knees every time Nilsson returned to the Met. When he did this after having been knighted by Queen Elizabeth, she said, "You do that much better since you practiced for the queen."

Bing asked Nilsson to sing the final scene from ''Salome'' at his farewell gala in 1972. As an added inducement, he said that she could have his head on a platter. Nilsson replied, "Oh, that's not necessary, Mr. Bing. I will use my imagination."

Nilsson did not get along with famous conductor Herbert von Karajan. Once when rehearsing on stage at the Vienna Staatsoper, her string of pearls broke. While helping her retrieve them, Karajan asked, "Are these real pearls bought with your fabulous Metropolitan Opera fees?" Nilsson replied, "No, these are very ordinary fake pearls bought with your lousy Vienna Staatsoper fees." When Nilsson first arrived at the Met to rehearse the production of ''Die Walkure'' conducted by Karajan, she said, "Nu, where's Herbie?" And Karajan once sent Nilsson a cable several pages long, proposing in great detail a variety of projects, different dates and operas. Nilsson cabled back: "Busy. Birgit."

There was a healthy competition between Nilsson and tenor Franco Corelli as to who could hold the high C the longest in Act II of ''Turandot.'' In one tour performance, after she outlasted him on the high C, he stormed off to Bing during the next intermission, saying that he was not going to continue the performance. Bing, who knew how to handle Corelli's tantrums, suggested that he retaliate by biting Nilsson on the neck when Calaf kisses Turandot in Act III. Corelli didn't bite her but he was so delighted with the idea that he told her about Bing's suggestion. She then cabled Bing, informing him that she had to cancel the next two tour Turandot performances because she had contracted rabies.

Once, when Nilsson was unhappy with something at the Met, she told Bing, "You know, when the birds are not happy, they do not sing."

Others got in their own quips about Nilsson. Bing was once asked if Nilsson was difficult to work with. "On the contrary," said Bing, "she's very easy to work with. You put money in, and beautiful sounds come out."

When Nilsson started singing Aida at the Met, soprano Zinka Milanov was miffed; Aida had been ''her'' role. After one performance in which Nilsson was singing, Milanov commandeered and drove off in the Rolls Royce Nilsson had hired for after the performance. When asked about this afterwards, Milanov said, "If Madame Nilsson takes ''my'' roles, I must take ''her'' Rolls."

Business

Nilsson was also famous for her ability to make money. She became one of the highest-paid singers in the field, in part because of the rarity of her skills. Being a shrewd businesswoman, she negotiated much of her own career. She never ranted or engaged in tantrums. She was also too proud to make outright demands. She would begin contract talks by refusing every offer and being evasive about her availability. This tack would continue until the impresario offered something she wanted. Nilsson's reply would be "maybe." Now in control, she would be begged to accept what she desired in the first place.

Once, asked what was her favourite role, she answered: "Isolde made me famous. Turandot made me rich". When long-time Metropolitan Opera director Sir Rudolf Bing was asked if she was difficult, he reportedly said, "Not at all. You put enough money in, and a glorious voice comes out." When Nilsson was preparing her taxes and was asked if she had any dependents, she replied, "Yes, just one, Rudolf Bing."

Interactions with conductors

Nilsson was known for standing up to conductors. In a 1967 rehearsal of ''Die Walküre'' with Herbert von Karajan conducting, Nilsson responded to the gloomy lighting of the production by wearing a miner's helmet (complete with Valkyrian wings). When on some occasion von Karajan urged a retake "and this time with our hearts - that's where your wallet has its place", Nilsson replied, "I'm glad to know that we have at least one thing in common, Maëstro von Karajan!" When Georg Solti, in ''Tristan und Isolde'', insisted on tempos too slow for Nilsson's taste, she made the first performance even slower, inducing a conductorial change of heart. After a tiff with Hans Knappertsbusch, Nilsson reported: "He called me by a name that begins with "A" and ends with 'hole'".

Self-criticism

Despite her worldwide recognition, Nilsson said she was nervous before every major performance. "Before a premiere, on the way to the opera, I'd hope for just a small, small accident, it didn't need to be much, but just so I would not have to sing", she said in a 1977 interview on Swedish TV.

Nilsson often spoke of her limits. She said her voice was not a good fit with what she described as the softer textures and refined tones of Italian operas. Nonetheless, she sang roles in Italian operas such as Donna Anna in ''Don Giovanni''.

Recordings

Nilsson recorded all of her major roles. Partly because of her availability to play Brünnhilde, Decca Records undertook the audacious and extremely expensive project of making the first studio recording of Wagner's four-opera Ring cycle, conducted by Solti and produced by John Culshaw. The effort took seven years, from 1958 to 1965. A film of the proceedings made her a familiar image for arts-conscious television viewers.

Absence from New York and Salzburg

Though a frequent visitor to the Metropolitan Opera, Nilsson did not always see eye to eye with its redoubtable general manager, Rudolf Bing (who was often said to dislike Wagner), nor with conductor Herbert von Karajan. Subsequently, she made fewer New York appearances than hoped in the early 1970s and was virtually excluded from the Salzburg Festival. Her American career was derailed in the mid-1970s by US Internal Revenue Service claims filed for back taxes. Several years later a schedule of payments was worked out, and Nilsson's hiatus from the United States ended. When she returned, Donal Henahan wrote in the ''New York Times'', "The famous shining trumpet of a voice is still far from sounding like a cornet."

Nilsson appeared at the Metropolitan Opera 223 times in 16 roles. She sang two complete ''Ring'' cycles in the 1961–62 season, and another in 1974–75. She was Isolde 33 times, and Turandot 52. She played most of the other major soprano parts: Aida, Tosca, the Dyer's Wife in Strauss's ''Die Frau ohne Schatten'', ''Salome'', ''Elektra'', as Verdi's Lady Macbeth, Leonore in Beethoven's ''Fidelio,'' and both Venus and Elisabeth in Wagner's ''Tannhäuser.'' She memorably appeared as replacement Sieglinde to Rita Hunter's Brünnhilde in the 1970s. She appeared 232 times at the Vienna State Opera from 1954–82, and the Vienna Philharmonic, the company's orchestra, made her an honorary member in 1999. "If there ever was someone that one can call a real star today and a world-famous opera singer during her time then that was Frau Nilsson", said Ioan Holender, director of the Vienna State Opera.

Later life

Nilsson's autobiography, ''Mina minnesbilder'' (My memoirs in pictures) was published in Stockholm in 1977. She retired in 1984 to her childhood home in the Skåne province of southern Sweden, where her father had been a sixth-generation farmer and she had worked to grow beets and potatoes until she was 23. In an interview in the mid-1990s, she appeared happy, serene and as unpretentious as ever. "I've always tried to remember what my mother used to tell me", she said. "Stay close to the earth. Then when you fall down, it won't hurt so much."

In 1981, Sweden issued a postage stamp showing Nilsson as Turandot. She has received the Illis Quorum gold medal, today the highest award that can be conferred upon a Swedish citizen by the Government of Sweden. In 1988, the American Scandinavian Foundation named their prize for promising young American opera singers the Birgit Nilsson Prize. Nilsson personally chaired several of the competitions.

Nilsson died aged 87, on Christmas Day, 2005 in her home at Bjärlöv, a small village near Kristianstad in Skåne in the same county where she was born. She was survived by her husband Bertil Niklasson (who died in March 2007), a veterinarian whom she had met on a train and married in 1948. They had no children.

Her legacy

Three years after Nilsson's death, in December 2008, the Birgit Nilsson Foundation announced that it would award a prize every two to three years to a concert or opera singer, a classical or opera conductor, or a specific production by an opera company. The Birgit Nilsson Prize was founded by Birgit Nilsson herself. The foundation said that Nilsson had chosen the first winner, to be announced in early 2009. On 20 February 2009, Spanish tenor Placido Domingo was announced as the inaugural recipient of the prize, which carried with it a cash award of $1,000,000. The first award ceremony took place in the Royal Swedish Opera on 13 October 2009. King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden personally presented the prize to the designated winner. A jury has been set up by the foundation to make recommendations for future prizes. The second winner of the Birgit Nilsson prize was Riccardo Muti, who will receive the award in Stockholm on 13 October 2011.

On 6 April 2011, the Bank of Sweden announced that Nilsson's portrait will feature on the 500 kronor banknote, beginning in 2014-15.

Awards

Sonning Award (1966, Denmark)

Anecdotes

As Oren Brown says in his vocal technique book, although not expected from a Wagnerian singer, Birgit Nilsson would warm up her voice by singing the Queen of the Night's arias from Mozart's ''Die Zauberflöte''.

References

Nilsson, Birgit, ''My Memoirs in Pictures'', translated from the Swedish by Thomas Teal, Garden City: Doubleday, 1981. ISBN 0-385-14835-6.

Nilsson, Birgit, ''Mina minnesbilder'', Stockholm: Bonnier, 1977. ISBN 91-0-042069-7

Nilsson, Birgit, ''La Nilsson'', Stockholm: Fischer, 1995. ISBN 91-7054-756-4.

"Birgit Nilsson, Soprano Legend Who Tamed Wagner" by Bernard Holland, ''New York Times'' (January 12, 2006)

"Så höll han allt hemligt", (why Nilsson's death was kept a secret for 16 days) by Pelle Tagesson, ''Aftonbladet'' (January 13, 2006)

Blum, David, "The Farm Girl and the Stones", chapter 5 in David Blum, ''Quintet, Five Journeys toward Musical Fulfillment'' (Cornell University Press, 1999).

Further reading

''La Nilsson: My Life in Opera'' by Birgit Nilsson, foreword by Georg Solti, afterword by Peggy Tueller. Translated by Doris Jung Popper UPNE, 2007 ISBN 1555536700, 9781555536701

External links

Audio

Birgit Nilsson sings ''Turandot'', 1960s (video)

Birgit Nilsson sings Tosca; ''Vissi D'arte'', 1960s (video)

Birgit Nilsson sings Wagner; ''Liebestod'', 1967 (video)

Birgit Nilsson - Salome - Gala Bing, MET 1972 (video)

Birgit Nilsson as Lady Macbeth, 1970s (video)

Birgit Nilsson as Brünnhilde, recording at the Royal Opera in Stockholm, November 18, 1956 (audio)

Birgit Nilsson conducted by Charles Mackerras for the 'Sydney Opera House Opening Concert', 1973 on australianscreen online

TV appearances

Birgit Nilsson on Swedish talk show "På parkett", after a recent performance as Turandot in Berlin, May 15, 1971 (part 1) (in Swedish)

Birgit Nilsson on Swedish talk show "På parkett", with composer Sten Broman, May 15, 1971 (part 2) (in Swedish)

Birgit Nilsson and Zarah Leander talking about life as a celebrity, on Swedish talk show "Stjärna mot stjärna" (Star vs Star), December 25, 1977 (in Swedish)

Birgit Nilsson and Franco Corelli, on Swedish talk show "Här är ditt liv" (This is your life; Birgit Nilsson), Nov 1981 (in Swedish)

News report from 1984 from when Birgit Nilsson gives a Master Class in Malmö, Sweden (in Swedish)

Swedish news report from Birgit Nilsson's death with video clip together with comments from workers, fans and colleagues at the Royal Swedish Opera in Stockholm, Metropolitan in New York, the Wagner Society and from Italian Opera (January 2006)

Interviews & articles

"Glänsande debut", the debut at the Royal Opera in Stockholm, Dagens Nyheter, October 10, 1946 (in Swedish)

"Det finns ingen genväg för sångare", interview, Dagens Nyheter, August 17, 1986 (in Swedish)

"Birgit Nilsson fyller 85 utan krusiduller", interview, Svenska Dagbladet, May 16, 2003 (in Swedish)

"Sjuksköterskorna mobbad mig, Operastjärnan Birgit Nilsson anmäler sjukhus för vanvård", Aftonbladet June 30, 1999 (in Swedish)

"Så höll han allt hemligt", why Nilsson's death was kept a secret for 16 days, Aftonbladet, January 13, 2006 (in Swedish)

"Birgit Nilsson: An unparalleled artist and a lovely, down-to-earth woman", by Jane Eaglen, The New York Times, January 16, 2006

"Varewell to the Valkyrie", by Peter G. Davis, Opera News, April 2006, Vol. 70, No. 10, p. 82-3

Birgit Nilsson interview by Bruce Duffie, April 20, 1988

Other

The Official Site

Wagner Operas

Decca Classics - Birgit Nilsson

Metropolitan Opera Archives

The One Million Dollar Birgit Nilsson Prize

The Birgit Nilsson Prize by the American-Scandinavian Foundation

Category:1918 births Category:2005 deaths Category:People from Båstad Municipality Category:Operatic sopranos Category:People from Scania Category:Swedish Lutherans Category:Swedish sopranos Category:Swedish female singers Category:Swedish opera singers Category:Honorary Members of the Royal Academy of Music

ca:Birgit Nilsson da:Birgit Nilsson de:Birgit Nilsson et:Birgit Nilsson es:Birgit Nilsson fr:Birgit Nilsson it:Birgit Nilsson he:בירגיט נילסון hu:Birgit Nilsson nl:Birgit Nilsson ja:ビルギット・ニルソン no:Birgit Nilsson pl:Birgit Nilsson pt:Birgit Nilsson ru:Нильссон, Биргит sl:Birgit Nilsson fi:Birgit Nilsson sv:Birgit Nilsson tl:Birgit Nilsson th:เบอร์จิต นิลส์สัน zh:比尔吉特·尼尔森