The Bayreuth premiere cast of Parsifal lists the contributors to the new productions of Richard Wagner's inaugural stage play ''

Parsifal ''Parsifal'' ( WWV 111) is an opera or a music drama in three acts by the German composer Richard Wagner and his last composition. Wagner's own libretto for the work is loosely based on the 13th-century Middle High German epic poem ''Parzival'' ...

'', including the premiere, which took place on 26 July 1882 at the

Bayreuth Festival The Bayreuth Festival (german: link=no, Bayreuther Festspiele) is a music festival held annually in Bayreuth, Germany, at which performances of operas by the 19th-century German composer Richard Wagner are presented. Wagner himself conceived ...

About the performance history

In the last performance of the premiere series in 1882, Richard Wagner personally took over the baton from

Hermann Levi Hermann Levi (7 November 1839 – 13 May 1900) was a German Jewish orchestral conductor. Levi was born in Giessen, Germany, the son of a rabbi. He was educated at Giessen and Mannheim, and came to Vinzenz Lachner's notice. From 1855 to 1858 L ...

in Act III, unnoticed by the audience, since the overbuilt orchestra pit of the Festspielhaus made the conductor and the orchestra invisible to the public. It was the only time the composer conducted in his house himself. ''Parsifal'' was composed especially for the Bayreuth Festival Theatre and, as Wagner stated in a letter to King

Ludwig II of Bavaria Ludwig II (Ludwig Otto Friedrich Wilhelm; 25 August 1845 – 13 June 1886) was King of Bavaria from 1864 until his death in 1886. He is sometimes called the Swan King or ('the Fairy Tale King'). He also held the titles of Count Palatine of the ...

in 1880, was to be performed there exclusively. The premiere production was virtually sacrosanct in Bayreuth and remained almost unchanged on the festival programme for 51 years. Hermann Levi remained conductor until 1894, only in 1888 (and then in 1897)

Felix Mottl right Felix Josef von Mottl (between 29 July/29 August 1856 – 2 July 1911) was an Austrian conductor and composer. He was regarded as one of the most brilliant conductors of his day. He composed three operas, of which ''Agnes Bernauer'' (Weima ...

conducted

. Later, Franz Fischer and

Karl Muck Karl Muck (October 22, 1859 – March 3, 1940) was a German-born conductor of Classical music. He based his activities principally in Europe and mostly in opera. His American career comprised two stints at the Boston Symphony Orchestra (BSO). M ...

also took over the musical direction of the ''Parsifal'' festival performances.Wagneropera.net:
Conductors Parsifal Bayreuth
', retrieved on 22 July 2020. The protection period of 30 years after the composer's death ended on December 31, 1913, but as early as 1901, the widow of the composer and director of the Festival,

Cosima Wagner Francesca Gaetana Cosima Wagner ( née Liszt; 24 December 1837 – 1 April 1930) was the daughter of the Hungarian composer and pianist Franz Liszt and Franco-German romantic author Marie d'Agoult. She became the second wife of the German co ...

, turned to the

German Reichstag The Reichstag (, ; officially: – ; en, Parliament) is a historic government building in Berlin which houses the Bundestag, the lower house of Germany's parliament. It was constructed to house the Imperial Diet (german: Reichstag) of the ...

with the request to secure the sole performing rights for Bayreuth. The request was rejected. Already before the end of the protection period, unauthorized performances took place, for example at the

Metropolitan Opera The Metropolitan Opera (commonly known as the Met) is an American opera company based in New York City, resident at the Metropolitan Opera House at Lincoln Center, currently situated on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. The company is operat ...

in New York on 24 December 1903, on Cosima's 66th birthday, and in Amsterdam.Christian Wildhagen:
History of "Parsifal": The Grail Robbery of Bayreuth
''

Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung The ''Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung'' (; ''FAZ''; "''Frankfurt General Newspaper''") is a centre-right conservative-liberal and liberal-conservativeHans Magnus Enzensberger: Alter Wein in neuen Schläuchen' (in German). ''Deutschland Radio'', ...

'', 22 January 2014, retrieved on 22 July 2020. After the end of the protection period, forty productions of the work were staged within the month of January 1914. The first of these ''legal'' productions began on New Year's Eve 1913 at 11:30 a.m. in the Teatro

Liceu The Gran Teatre del Liceu (, English: Great Theatre of the Lyceum), known as ''El Liceu'', is an opera house in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain. Located in La Rambla, it is the oldest running theatre in Barcelona. Founded in 1837 at another loca ...

of Barcelona.Wagneropera.net:
Parsifal
', retrieved on 22 July 2020. To this day ''Parsifal'' is the most frequently performed work of the Bayreuth Festival.

1934

It was not until 1934 that a new production with stage designs by

Alfred Roller Alfred Roller (2 October 1864 – 21 June 1935) was an Austrian painter, graphic designer, and set designer. His wife was Mileva Roller and they were members of the Viennese Secession movement. Life and work Roller was born in Brünn (Brn ...

, Hitler's favourite stage designer, was shown, commissioned by Hitler. After the politically motivated cancellation of

Arturo Toscanini Arturo Toscanini (; ; March 25, 1867January 16, 1957) was an Italian conductor. He was one of the most acclaimed and influential musicians of the late 19th and early 20th century, renowned for his intensity, his perfectionism, his ear for orch ...

, who was supposed to conduct the new production,

Richard Strauss Richard Georg Strauss (; 11 June 1864 – 8 September 1949) was a German composer, conductor, pianist, and violinist. Considered a leading composer of the late Romantic and early modern eras, he has been described as a successor of Richard Wag ...

stepped in. After the beginning of the Second World War, the work - presumably because of its message of reconciliation - was no longer allowed to be performed in Bayreuth at Hitler's behest. As if by a miracle, the Bayreuth Festival Theatre was not destroyed in the Allied bombing war, but two thirds of the city lay in ruins. Half of the Villa

Wahnfried Wahnfried was the name given by Richard Wagner to his villa in Bayreuth. The name is a German compound of (delusion, madness) and (peace, freedom). Financed by King Ludwig II of Bavaria, the house was constructed from 1872 to 1874 under Bayreu ...

was also destroyed on 5 April 1945, and the hall, including the rotunda and the floor above it, as well as the southeastern part of the house were blown up.

1951

When the Bayreuth Festival was able to reinstate itself in 1951, the new artistic director of the Festival,

Wieland Wagner Wieland Wagner (5 January 1917 – 17 October 1966) was a German opera director, grandson of Richard Wagner. As co-director of the Bayreuth Festival when it re-opened after World War II, he was noted for innovative new stagings of the operas, depa ...

presented a radical new version of ''Parsifal'' as the first production of the "New Bayreuth". He dispensed with a detailed naturalism and placed the music in the foreground through abstraction and suggestive lighting direction. The events on stage were expressively condensed and only underlined by extremely withdrawn, stylized and meaningful gestures and movements. His Bayreuth staging style became a much-copied model for numerous Wagner productions up to the 1970s. The new production was conducted by

Hans Knappertsbusch Hans Knappertsbusch (12 March 1888 – 25 October 1965) was a German conductor, best known for his performances of the music of Wagner, Bruckner and Richard Strauss. Knappertsbusch followed the traditional route for an aspiring conductor in Germ ...

and has also been released on record.Amazon:
de/Richard-Wagner-Parsifal-Gesamtaufnahme-Bayreuth/dp/B000000SH0 Richard Wagner: Parsifal (complete recording) (Live, Bayreuth 1951) Box-Set
', retrieved 22 July 2020. Wieland Wagner's production remained on the Bayreuth repertoire for more than twenty years and reached 101 performances. The premiere was cast with the world's best Wagner singers, including

Wolfgang Windgassen Wolfgang Windgassen (26 June 1914 – 8 September 1974) was a heldentenor internationally known for his performances in Wagner operas. Life and career Born in Annemasse, France, he was the son (and pupil) of a well known German Heldentenor, Fritz ...

in the title role,

Martha Mödl Martha Mödl (22 March 1912, Nuremberg – 17 December 2001, Stuttgart) was a German soprano, and later a mezzo-soprano. She specialized in large dramatic roles such as Isolde, Brünnhilde, and particularly Kundry, and is considered, along with Ast ...

as Kundry and George London as Amfortas.

Premiere castings

The sixth column shows the number of performances of each production.

Sources

Inszenierungsübersicht der Bayreuther Festspiele
(vollständig ab 1951), retrieved 22 July 2020
Tamino Autographs
Besetzungszettel der Aufführung vom 23. August 1934, retrieved 22 July 2020
Tamino Autographs
Besetzungszettel der Aufführung vom 23. Juli 1937, retrieved 22 July 2020

References

{{Portal bar, Opera, Germany Bayreuth Festival Richard Wagner