Editing Bayreuth (section)

===Richard Wagner and Bayreuth===

[[File:Wahnfried 2 db.jpg|thumb|Wagner family home, Haus [[Wahnfried]]]]
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. In the northern part of Bayreuth is the [[Bayreuth Festspielhaus|Festival Hall]], an [[opera house]] specially constructed for and exclusively devoted to the performance of Wagner's [[opera]]s. The premieres of the final two works of Wagner's ''[[Der Ring des Nibelungen|Ring Cycle]]'' ("[[Siegfried (opera)|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 – "Nietzsche clearly preferred to see Bayreuth fail than succeed by mirroring a society gone wrong."<ref>Bergmann, Peter. ''Nietzsche: the Last Antipolitical German'', Indiana University press, 1987, p. 102. {{ISBN|0-253-34061-6}}.</ref>