{"product_id":"bayreuth-a-history-of-the-wagner-festival-9780300066654","title":"Bayreuth: A History of the Wagner Festival","description":"\u003cp\u003eGermanys cultural glory and for a time Germanys political shame: the operatic festival established by Richard Wagner in 1876 is one of the most intriguing phenomena in modern European intellectual history. The oldest and best known of all musical festivals  Bayreuth soon after Wagners death in 1883 became the center of a reactionary and nationalistic ideological cult. This book is the first to provide a frank and fully rounded account of the institution and the way it operates.  The focus of the study is a critical analysis of the performances and productions  brought alive with photographs and sketches of stage settings  conductors  singers  and costumes from 1876 to 1990. Around this artistic history is woven the remarkable story of why  against tremendous odds  Wagner built his famous Festspielhaus and established his controversial festival and of how his descendants have managed to keep it alive. At the same time  the book traces the institutions association with nationalism and racism  its eventual debasement into \"Hitlers court theatre \" and its postwar liberation from its chauvinist  anti-Semitic past.  With its own form of Wagnerian Gesamtkunstwerklinking art  the personalities of the Wagner family  and German ideological developmentthis provocative study will be compelling reading not only for Wagner enthusiasts but also for anyone interested in European intellectual history since 1876.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"My Store","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":45647597404213,"sku":"ByrdShop_0300066651","price":31.92,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0627\/8139\/0901\/files\/9780300066654.jpg?v=1781695111","url":"https:\/\/atxbooks.com\/products\/bayreuth-a-history-of-the-wagner-festival-9780300066654","provider":"ATX Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}