10 AUGUST 1996, Page 22

Some of his best friends .

Sir: Pursuant to Michael Tanner's superb analysis of Wagner's alleged anti-Semitism (Arts, 27 July), heretofore unknown is the fact that the best friend of Wagner's only child, Siegfried, during his early school years, was a German Jew named Gustav Oppenheim. If the Wagner household in Bayreuth had been one of virulent anti- Semitism, Cosima and Richard Wagner would never have permitted their beloved only child, Siegfried, to be in the constant company, at school and at home, of a Jew- ish child.

When Gustav, who migrated to America in the early 1900s, had a son, he named him Siegfried, in honour of his old friend. Siegfried Oppenheim, a Jew, is now 87 and lives in New York City.

Anne Merrian

319E 50th Street, New York City