​Der fliegende Holländer

One of the chapters of the German Romantic poet and prose writer Heinrich Heine’s novel The Memoirs of Mister von Schnabelewopski describes the  “Flying Dutchman”, a sea captain who strives to outdo Nature by sailing through a ferocious storm and is duly cursed for his blasphemy, with his one and only hope for redemption by death being the true love of a woman. The story immediately captivated Richard Wagner. What more could a Romantic composer wish than to express through music a stormy sea, ruffled human souls, amorous passions and the determination to die for love? The lead heroine, Senta, embodies Wagner’s notion of the ideal woman, prepared to sacrifice herself in order to save a male hero.

Der fliegende Holländer links up to the tradition of Carl Maria von Weber’s and Heinrich Marschner’s German Romantic operas. Yet even though still adhering to the conventional structure of self-contained numbers with recitatives and arias, in this work…