Unlike most opera composers, Wagner wrote both the libretto and the music for each of his stage works. Wilhelm Richard Wagner ( / ˈ v ɑː ɡ n ər/ VAHG-nər German: ( listen) – 13 February 1883) was a German composer, theatre director, polemicist, and conductor who is chiefly known for his operas (or, as some of his mature works were later known, 'music dramas').