Society of the Friends of Bayreuth

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Society of Friends of Bayreuth eV is a patron society with almost 5,500 members and is based in Bayreuth . It was founded on September 22, 1949, initiated by Richard Wagner's grandchildren , Wieland and Wolfgang Wagner , in order to be able to resume or re-establish the Bayreuth Festival , which was last held in 1944, with financial support. The first festival after the war took place in 1951.

activity

The main purpose of the association is to provide financial support for the Bayreuth Festival. In addition, existing surpluses are made possible for those with limited resources to participate in the festival performances, for example through donations to the Richard Wagner Scholarship Foundation . The "Friends" have so far provided over 65 million euros for the festival. For a number of years the company's annual financial resources have exceeded 3 million euros per year. Since 2001 there has also been a “Friends of Bayreuth Foundation”, into which donations can be paid to build up the foundation's assets. In the summer of 2009, the “Service Society of Friends of Bayreuth GmbH” was founded for sponsoring, which is becoming more important .

Thanks to the company's financial support, it has been possible over the past few years and decades to secure, renovate and expand the entire historic building stock of the Bayreuth Festival Hall and the adjoining buildings. In addition, additional financial aid is regularly given to the festival management for new productions of Wagner's works. In return, the festival management provides the association with 14,000 tickets per year, the largest contingent of tickets given to an organization.

history

As early as 1871 Richard Wagner planned to finance his festival by means of a patronage association , which was supposed to cover the costs for the construction of the festival hall and the first season by selling 1000 patronage coupons. When only a third of the shares had been sold by 1873, King Ludwig II had to step in and provide a loan from his private assets. In 1921 patronage certificates were offered again and brought the hoped-for proceeds. However, this was devalued so quickly by the hyperinflation that the sponsors could not cover the costs of the festival this time either. The sponsors founded the Bayreuth Association as a sponsoring association, to which the Bayreuth Association of German Youth under Otto Daube joined on August 1, 1925 .

After the collapse of the “Third Reich”, which had financed the festival from the state, patrons came together to revive the festival. The decisive factor was Gerhard Roßbach , a former free corps leader and former NSDAP activist, who fell out of favor in 1934 but was on friendly terms with the Wagner family. In September 1949 the Society of Friends of Bayreuth was founded . The founding members were mainly industrialists such as Hans Bahlsen , Moritz Klönne , Franz Hilger and his son Ewald Hilger, who both would later lead the association, August Roesener , Joachim Vielmetter , Berthold Beitz , Konrad Pöhner , August Lenz and Otto Springorum . Moritz Klönne became the first chairman. As early as 1950, the company was able to provide 400,000 marks in donations and interest-free loans, so that it contributed significantly to the 1.5 million budget of the first post-war festival in 1951. Franz Hilger ran the friends from 1954 to 1969 , then his son Ewald Hilger until 1999.

In 1953 the Festival Board of Trustees was founded with the participation of the company. The friends undertook to work with the city of Bayreuth and the Upper Franconia district to cover a third of the costs of the festival in future. The other two thirds are borne by the Federal Republic of Germany and the Free State of Bavaria. The representatives of the public sector made it clear at the time that they would only participate if and for as long as private initiatives were retained and contributed to the financing. In 1954 the non-profit status of the society was recognized.

In 1973 the Wagner family took the mediation of friends , the Festspielhaus and the estate of Richard Wagner in the Richard Wagner Foundation Bayreuth one on whose board of trustees, the company is represented. The number of members is currently over 5,000, including around 500 abroad. By this 25th anniversary of the association he had raised 8.7 million marks for the festival.

The friends were also involved in founding the Bayreuther Festspiele GmbH from 1985 to 1987. After the long-time festival director Wolfgang Wagner resigned in 2008, the Bayreuth Festival GmbH was reorganized and the "Friends" have been one of the four shareholders since then. The Federal Republic of Germany, the Free State of Bavaria, the City of Bayreuth and the Society of Friends of Bayreuth each hold 25% of the shares. All shareholders have a seat and vote on the board of directors and the shareholders' meeting of Bayreuther Festspiele GmbH according to the amount of their shares.

Between May 2009 and July 2010 there was some tumult on the Friends' Board, with the resignations of Peter Gloystein / Düsseldorf, Ulrich Andreas Vogt and Hans-Ludwig Grüschow / Neu-Isenburg. Since then, Georg Freiherr von Waldenfels has been chairman and treasurer, and Wolfgang Wagner , the former President of the Upper Franconian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, and Stephan Götzl , Chairman of the Board and President of the Bavarian Cooperative Association, were elected to the now three-person board.

structure

In addition to the three-person board of directors made up of Georg Freiherr von Waldenfels, Wolfgang Wagner and Stephan Götzl, there is a board of trustees that supports the board as a representative of the general assembly. The board of trustees consists of at least 10 people and has been chaired by Gerhard Wiesheu from Bankhaus Metzler since September 2013 (as of 2015).

The "Young Friends of Bayreuth" were founded in summer 2008 and have around 300 members (as of December 2014). This is intended to give those under 35 who are interested in Wagner the opportunity to exchange ideas and support the Bayreuth Festival.

Since 2010, the “Team of Active Festival Sponsors” (TAff) has been another, much smaller sponsorship association.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Ruhrnachrichten: Ex-Konzerthaus director Vogt is engine in Bayreuth , November 11th, 2009
  2. ↑ Lucas Wiegelmann: "Not compatible with the federal funding goals" . Die Welt , June 24, 2011
  3. ↑ Unless otherwise stated, the history of the company is based on: Nicolaus Steeken: The invention of fundraising . In: Society of Friends of Bayreuth: Almanach 2010 , ISBN 978-3925361845 , pages 144–151
  4. ↑ Ewald Hilger: Hopeless Optimists . In: Society of Friends of Bayreuth: Almanach 2012 , ISBN 978-3-943637-02-1 , pages 194-201
  5. ↑ Wolfgang Wagner (Ed.): Bayreuther Festspiele 1999 , Bayreuther Festspiele GmbH 1999
  6. ↑ Nordbayerischer Kurier: Zoff with the "Friends of Bayreuth" , June 25, 2010
  7. ↑ Nordbayerischer Kurier: Friends turn the board inside out , June 29, 2010
  8. ↑ Nürnberger Zeitung: Friends of Bayreuth change their management team  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , June 28, 2010@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.nz-online.de  
  9. ↑ Nordbayerischer Kurier: The friends of Bayreuth are rumbling , July 28, 2010
  10. ↑ Associated Press: Conflict overshadows the Bayreuth Festival ( Memento of the original from August 3, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , July 27, 2010 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / de.news.yahoo.com
  11. ↑ Nordbayerischer Kurier: Taff starts on August 10, 2010