Germany (Lonely Planet, 6th Edition) - Andrea Schulte-Peevers [319]
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RICHARD WAGNER
With the backing of King Ludwig II, Richard Wagner (1813–83), the gifted, Leipzig-born composer and notoriously poor manager of money, turned Bayreuth into a mecca of opera and high-minded excess. Bayreuth profited from its luck and, it seems, is ever grateful.
For Wagner, opera-listening was meant to be work, and he tested his listeners wherever possible. Götterdämmerung, Parsifal, Tannhäuser and Tristan and Isolde are grandiose pieces that will jolt any audience geared for light entertainment. Four days of The Ring of the Nibelungen are good for limbering up.
After poring over Passau and a few other German cities, Wagner designed his own festival hall in Bayreuth. The unique acoustics are bounced up from a below-stage orchestra via reflecting boards onto the stage and into the house. The design took the body density of a packed house into account, still a remarkable achievement today.
Wagner was also a notorious womaniser, an infamous anti-Semite and a hardliner towards ‘non-Europeans’. So extreme were these views that even Friedrich Nietzsche called Wagner’s works ‘inherently reactionary, and inhumane’. Wagner’s works, and by extension Wagner himself, were embraced as a symbol of Aryan might by the Nazis, and even today there is great debate among music lovers about the ‘correctness’ of supporting Wagnerian music and the Wagner Festival in Bayreuth.
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OUTSIDE THE TOWN CENTRE
North of the Hauptbahnhof, the main venue for Bayreuth’s annual Wagner Festival is the Festspielhaus ( 787 80; Festspielhügel 1-2; adult/concession €5/4; tours 10am & 2pm Dec-Mar, Apr-Aug when rehearsals permit, 10am, 11am, 2pm & 3pm Sep & Oct, closed Mon & Nov), constructed in 1872 with Ludwig II’s backing. The structure was specially designed to accommodate Wagner’s massive theatrical sets, with three storeys of mechanical works hidden below stage (see boxed text, above). Take bus 5 to Am Festspielhaus.
About 6km east of the centre lies the Eremitage, a lush park girding the Altes Schloss ( 759 6937), Friedrich and Wilhelmine’s summer residence. At the time of research its rococo interiors were being returned to their original state with renovation work set to finish by mid-2010. Also in the park is horseshoe-shaped Neues Schloss (not to be confused with the one in town), which centres on the amazing mosaic Sun Temple with gilded Apollo sculpture. Around both palaces you’ll find numerous grottoes, follies and gushing fountains. To get there take bus 2 from Markt.
For a fascinating look at the brewing process, head to the enormous Maisel’s Brauerei-und-Büttnerei-Museum (Maisel’s Brewery & Coopers Museum; 401 234; Kulmbacher Strasse 40; tours adult/concession €4/2) next door to the brewery of one of Germany’s finest wheat-beer makers. The 90-minute guided tour (2pm daily, in German) takes you into the bowels of the 19th-century plant, with atmospheric rooms filled with 4500 beer mugs and amusing artefacts.
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Festivals & Events
The Wagner Festival (www.bayreuther-festspiele.de) has been a summer fixture for over 130 years. The event lasts 30 days, with each performance attended by an audience of 1900. Demand is insane, with an estimated 500,000 fans vying for less than 60,000 tickets. Tickets are allocated by lottery but preference is given to patrons and Wagner enthusiasts. To apply, send a letter (no phone, fax