Photo: Wagner in Bayreuth, 2004.
The official announcement came today: Wolfgang Wagner, Richard Wagner's grandson, will step down as director of the Bayreuth Festival on August 31, one day after his eighty-ninth birthday. He has been in charge since the first postwar festival in 1951, though he shared power with his brother Wieland until Wieland's death in 1966. His daughters, Eva Wagner-Pasquier and Katharina Wagner, have made a joint bid to take direction of Bayreuth in his wake. More at Bloomberg Arts.
