Wilhelm Richard Wagner (22 May 1813 – 13 February 1883) is a German composer, conductor, theater director and polemicist primarily known for his operas (or "music dramas", as he later calls them).

Wagner's compositions, particularly those of his later period, are notable for their complex texture, rich harmonies and orchestration, and the elaborate use of leitmotifs: musical themes associated with individual characters, places, ideas or plot elements.

Unlike most other opera composers, Wagner writes both the music and libretto for every one of his stage works.

Perhaps the two best-known extracts from his works are the Ride of the Valkyries from the opera Die Walküre, and the Wedding March (Bridal Chorus) from the opera Lohengrin.

Initially establishing his reputation as a composer of works such as The Flying Dutchman and Tannhäuser, which are broadly in the romantic vein of Weber and Meyerbeer, Wagner transforma operatic thought through his concept of the Gesamtkunstwerk ("total work of art").

This would achieve the synthesis of all the poetic, visual, musical and dramatic arts and is announced in a series of essays between 1849 and 1852.

Wagner realizes this concept most fully in the first half of the monumental four-opera cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen.

However, his thoughts on the relative importance of music and drama are to change again, and he reintroduces some traditional operatic forms into his last few stage works, including Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg.

Wagner pioneers advances in musical language, such as extreme chromaticism and quickly shifting tonal centers, which greatly influence the development of European classical music.

His Tristan und Isolde is sometimes described as marking the start of modern music.

Wagner's influence spreads beyond music into philosophy, literature, the visual arts and theater.

He has his own opera house built, the Bayreuth Festspielhaus, which contains many novel design features.

It is here that the Ring and Parsifal receive their premieres and where his most important stage works continue to be performed today in an annual festival run by his descendants.

Wagner's views on conducting are also highly influential.

His extensive writings on music, drama and politics have all attracted extensive comment in recent decades, especially where they have anti-Jewish content.

Wagner achieves all of this despite a life characterized, until his last decades, by political exile, turbulent love affairs, poverty and repeated flight from his creditors.

His pugnacious personality and often outspoken views on music, politics and society made him a controversial figure during his life, which he remains to this day.

The effect of his ideas can be traced in many of the arts throughout the twentieth century.