Wagner festival is named after a murdered Jew
mainLeipzig has just announced an International Richard Wagner Festival with all 13 operas from 20 June to 14 July 2022.
All well and good, Covid permitting.
But what’s unusual is the the festival has been named in honour of Gustav Brecher, the city’s general music director who was abused and kicked out by the Nazis in February 1933 and erased from history. Brecher, who was Jewish, fled to Prague and, when it was occupied, to Ostend. When the Germans entered Belgium in May 1940, he died by suicide together with his wife.
He was 61, a world-class conductor who had brought major operas by Weill and Krenek to the stage.
This is Leipzig’s belated act of restitution.
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