In his day, Anton Van Rooy was regarded as the greatest male singer in Wagnerian opera. Van Rooy studied voice in Frankfurt under Julius Stockhausen and began his career in 1894 as a singer of oratorio and German Lieder. Van Rooy made his operatic debut at the 1897 Bayreuth Festival in part through the urging of Cosima Wagner. He worked in the Bayreuth company until 1902, playing all the major bass roles in Richard Wagner's operas, including Wotan, the Dutchman, and Hans Sachs. Word about Van Rooy's exceptional talents and magnificent voice quickly spread and by the end of 1898, Van Rooy had made his first appearances at Covent Garden in London and at New York's Metropolitan Opera. He continued to be a favorite at the Met through 1908 and at Covent Garden through his retirement in 1913. In 1903, Van Rooy participated in the notorious "bootleg" performance of Parsifal at the Metropolitan; this was the first Parsifal to be given in defiance of Wagner's own rule banning any staging of the work outside of Bayreuth. While this performance laid the groundwork for making Parsifal available to the general public, it had grave implications for Van Rooy. When she learned of Van Rooy's betrayal, Cosima Wagner henceforth prohibited his appearance in any Bayreuth productions; indeed, Van Rooy was not even welcome to attend one as an audience member. It was obviously a serious challenge to Van Rooy, by then acclaimed as the top singer in Wagnerian opera, not to be able to appear at the house that was both home and hearth to the Wagnerian tradition. But he was still in demand elsewhere, and was able to enjoy a stellar career nonetheless. Van Rooy only left a slight trace of his voice for posterior evaluation on recordings. He was captured in performances at the Metropolitan Opera on five cylinders made by Lionel Mapleson in 1903, made 12 commercial recordings for Gramophone & Typewriter in London in 1902 and 1908, and ten more for American Columbia in 1907. These reveal that Van Rooy was indeed a powerful singer, rich, deep, and resonant. Van Rooy's is as fine a bass voice as can be found on early records; it's a pity he did not make more of them.