French composer, regarded today as the leading French musician of his era. The misunderstanding and neglect Berlioz endured, not least in his dealings with the Paris Opéra, helped him and Wagner to identify with each other as fellow- sufferers, although they failed to sustain a close friendship. Berlioz' music contains a number of interesting pre-echoes of Wagner. It is known that Wagner studied Berlioz' treatise on orchestration, during the 1840s.

Left: Paul von Joukowsky, Hermann Levi and Fritz Brandt.
Fritz Brandt had worked closely with his father Carl on the technical aspects of the first Ring and was invited to assume overall responsibility for the technical arrangements for the 1882 Parsifal following his father's sudden death in 1881; he returned to the Bayreuth festival in 1883 and 1884.

French author and writer on music, daughter of the writer Théophile Gautier. Judith was an enthusiast for Wagner's work from an early age. She met the equally devoted Catulle Mendès in the early 1860s and they were married in 1866. Together with the poet Villiers de l'Isle Adam they visited Wagner at Tribschen in 1869 and again the following year. In 1874 the Mendès couple decided to separate and by the time of the first Bayreuth festival, Judith had embarked on an affair with an amateur composer called Louis Benedictus. This did not discourage Wagner from pursuing her. Their relationship may or may not have been consummated; what is certain is that they continued to conduct a clandestine and intimate correspondence until 1878, when Cosima discovered some of the letters and put the affair to an end. Wagner claimed that he needed the intoxication of at least her spiritual presence, as well as the silks, satins and exotic perfumes she obtained for him in Paris, in order to compose Parsifal. Her intellectual contribution to Wagner's work consisted of a translation of Parsifal into French, various writings on Wagnerian topics, and a three-volume memoir of the composer.

Humperdinck (right) began his musical studies at the Cologne Conservatory under Hiller, a one-time friend of Wagner who had drifted into the anti-Wagner camp. Humperdinck had cast off the yoke of Hiller's Schumannesque style when he moved to Munich in 1877 and enrolled in the Königliches Musikschule. He heard the Ring in 1878 and soon afterwards joined a band of local Wagnerians calling themselves the Order of the Grail. He won the Mendelssohn prize in 1879, which funded a scholarship tour of Italy and, to Wagner's amusement, the Meyerbeer prize in 1881. Humperdinck worked as a repetiteur at every subsequent Bayreuth festival until 1894.

Hungarian composer and virtuoso pianist. He first met Wagner in Paris in March 1841, when Liszt was already at the height of his fame. But it was not until Liszt had retired from the concert platform that their friendship blossomed. It was to survive several periods of coolness, the most serious estrangement being the result of Wagner's involvement with Liszt's daughter, Cosima. The two composers were seen as the leaders of the New German School. They were each fascinated by the progressive musical ideas and innovations of the other: the influence of Liszt on Wagner can be seen most strongly in Tristan but it is also present in Parsifal.

Right: Ludwig II in General's uniform, by F. Piloty. © W. Neumeister.

Public opinion in Munich was scandalised by revelations about the composer's relationship with Cosima, at that time still married to the conductor Hans von Bülow, and by Wagner's supposed exploitation of the King's munificence; as a result of which, in December 1865, the King was forced to ask the composer to leave Munich. His support continued, however, and even though the relationship became strained, Ludwig made a timely contribution to the Bayreuth enterprise and remained fanatically devoted to Wagner's art. Ludwig withdrew progressively into his fantasy world of midnight sleigh rides, fantastic castles and Wagnerian extravagances such as his hunting lodge, based upon Hunding's hut. According to the Empress Elizabeth of Austria, he was just an eccentric living in a world of dreams.

His penchant for building fantastic castles of monumental extravagance, combined with his erratic behaviour and progressive lack of interest in affairs of state, eventually led to a declaration of insanity and to Ludwig's deposition on 10 June 1886. The King and his attendant psychiatrist were found drowned in Lake Starnberg three days later. Ludwig identified intensely with several of Wagner's heros, not least Parsifal. He would sometimes sign his letters to Wagner with Parsifal. Ludwig provided much of the financing for the first performances of Parsifal, allowing Wagner the use of the Munich orchestra and chorus but insisting that the orchestra's conductor, Hermann Levi, should conduct the performances.

German philosopher, who at the unprecedented age of 24 was appointed Professor of Classical Philology at Basle University. From the time of his visit to Tribschen the following year, he was a frequent and welcome guest at Wagner's house. His literary works were greatly admired by Wagner and Cosima, especially The Birth of Tragedy, which placed Wagner's art at the centre of Western culture. Nietzsche was fascinated and overwhelmed by the power of Wagner's music. The ambivalence of his attitude to Wagner began to appear in his essay, Richard Wagner in Bayreuth (1875-6). In subsequent years, he move into the anti-Wagner camp, and as his mental and physical health deteriorated (something which Wagner supposedly attributed to self- abuse), Nietzsche took up a bitterly hostile stance towards Wagner's decadent art.

German philosopher, the author of The World as Will and Representation, one of the great philosophical texts of the nineteenth century. Although he had no genuine successors and founded no school, his influence was very widespread from about the middle of the century onwards, his most famous disciple being Richard Wagner, who believed that Schopenhauer had revealed to him the meaning of his own works and who then consciously pursued a Schopenhauerian line. In the present century, Schopenhauer's philosophy of will has been one of the influences behind the development of existentialism and Freudian psychology.

Left: A portrait of Cosima Wagner, about 1879.
Daughter of Franz Liszt and the Countess d'Agoult, mistress and later the second wife of Richard Wagner. Cosima supported Wagner both emotionally and practically in the Bayreuth enterprise; on his death, she took immediate and effective control of the festival.

Right: A memorial bust of Richard Wagner, in Venice.
German composer and writer on an enormous range of subjects, with an opinion about everything. Wagner revolutionised the art of theatre and made a significant and lasting impression on orchestral music. In 1876 he inaugurated the Bayreuth Festival, which has now become an annual celebration of Wagner's art.

Right: Mathilde Wesendonck.
German poet and writer. The friendship of Wagner and Mathilde Wesendonck that began in 1852 developed subsequently into an intense relationship that may or may not have been consummated. The impossible passion of Tristan and Isolde was mirrored in the relationship between the composer and Mathilde, eventually resulting in a marital crisis in August 1858. Five of her poems were set by Wagner and are usually known as the Wesendonck Lieder. Wagner confided in her by letter his thoughts about his planned work, Parsifal, and eventually shared in her concern for antivivisection, as reflected in his treatment of the incident of the swan in the first act of the work.

Otto and Mathilde used the spelling 'Wesendonck'. Their son called himself Franz von Wesendonk. The spellings 'Wesendonck' and 'Wesendonk' are found in roughly equal proportion in Wagner literature.