Richard Wagner

WAGNER, (Wilhelm) Richard. b. Leipzig, 22 May 1813; d. Venice, 13 February 1883. Raised as the son of a police actuary, Carl Friedrich Wagner, he may in fact have been the son of the actor and painter, Ludwig Geyer, who looked after the boy’s welfare after Carl Friedrich died in November 1813. His education in Leipzig began to reveal at an early stage his interest in drama and music, and at Leipzig University he studied intensively for about six months in 1831 under the Kantor of the Thomaskirche, Christian Theodor Weinlig. His first compositions, notably his Symphony in C (1832), demonstrate an infatuation with the music of Beethoven, to whom he proclaimed himself, later, the rightful...