One hundred-eighty years later, it remains potent, even scary, stuff. “The Flying Dutchman,” written in 1843, was Wagner’s breakthrough opera, his first real masterpiece and the first in which he wove into the orchestral score musical motifs (or leitmotifs) associated with specific characters or ongoing elements of the story to enrich the narrative tapestry. There are complications, however, starting with her prior pledge to a simple huntsman called Erik, and both Senta’s vision and the Dutchman’s latest hope ultimately come crashing down together. Having become transfixed by a portrait of him and in her heart committed to his redemption, Senta is just waiting for him to show up and claim her. When Daland hears the Dutchman’s story and glimpses the astonishing treasures the unhappy man has amassed in his endless voyages, he bargains his daughter Senta as bride-savior in exchange for a share of that sparkling largesse.īut the girl already possess a psychic connection to the Dutchman. His latest docking brings him face to face with Daland, another sea captain. The penalty requires him to sail the seas without respite in seven-year stints until in his allowed landings of a single day to find a woman who will marry him and pledge eternal faithfulness. The Dutchman, who has no other name, long ago committed an offense that cast him into the devil’s sway. Senta’s father Daland (Mika Kares, left) and the Dutchman (Tomasz Konieczny) strike a deal for Senta’s hand. Setting aside a few problematic details in a generally effective production created by Christopher Aiden, a bold staging underpins the opera’s psychological skew and tumult, which also resonates authentically in the voices of a superb cast and in the graphic conducting of Lyric music director Enrique Mazzola. Still, there is a certain radiance to the bleakness and it suffuses a compelling account of Wagner’s music-drama at Lyric Opera of Chicago. “Dutchman” is one dark opera, populated by distraught or deeply neurotic characters for whom there is no relief and never will be. The sorry plight of Wagner’s Senta, the lass who obsesses about the accursed sea captain in “The Flying Dutchman,” always puts me in mind of Schubert’s plaintive Gretchen at the spinning wheel, bereft of peace and heavy of heart. Review: “The Flying Dutchman” by Richard Wagner, at Lyric Opera of Chicago through Oct. Tomasz Konieczny portrays the accursed sea captain with Tamara Wilson as Senta in Lyric Opera’s production of ‘The Flying Dutchman.’ (Todd Rosenberg photos)

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