Dates: 1876 – present
Official website: http://www.bayreuther-festspiele.de
Bayreuth is a sizeable town in northern Bavaria, Germany and is known for it’s association with Richard Wagner, renowned opera composer.
Every year, the Festival Hall (or Festspielhaus) is used for a month-long summer festival 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.
Richard Wagner lived in Bayreuth from 1872 until his death in 1883. His 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.