Wolfgang Wagner

Wolfgang Wagner (born 30 August 1919) is the director (Festspielleiter) of the Bayreuth Festival, a position he assumed alongside his brother Wieland in 1951. It was announced on 29 April 2008 that he will step down on 31 August 2008 when this year's festival has finished. Wolfgang is the son of Siegfried Wagner, the grandson of the German composer Richard Wagner, and the great-grandson of the composer Franz Liszt. He married twice, to Ellen Drexel and Gudrun Mack. Gudrun died in November 2007. He has three children: Eva, born 1945, Gottfried, born 1947 and Katharina, born 1978. He is reportedly estranged from both Eva (over control of the Bayreuth Festival) and Gottfried (over the family's connection with Adolf Hitler, a friend of Wolfgang's mother Winifred). Wolfgang worked with his older brother Wieland Wagner on the resurrection, in 1951, of the Bayreuth Festival following Germany's collapse after the Second World War. The festival has run on an annual basis since then. On... full article at wikipedia