‘The Flying Dutchman’ Sails Back to The Lyric Opera

‘The Flying Dutchman’ returns to The Lyric Opera in Chicago in a glowing revival of Richard Wagner’s famous opera.

The Lyric Opera of Chicago’s scenic design creates a feeling of the ship sailing across a furious sea, in its production of “The Flying Dutchman.” Todd Rosenberg

In 1839, when Richard Wagner (1813-1883) was 26 years old, he found himself up to his neck in debt. He was a conductor at a theater company in Riga (which, at the time, was part of Russia), but he couldn’t come up with the money to pay his extravagant bills.  He tried to escape from his creditors by boarding a ship bound for London and then Paris, which turned into a terrifying storm-tossed journey.

Once in Paris, his finances went from bad to worse. He couldn’t get a job as a conductor, and the Paris opera wasn’t interested in producing his recent work “Rienzi.”  That’s when Wagner recalled his terrible voyage and used German writer Heinrich Heine’s novel, which included the story of the “The Flying Dutchman,” and came up with the idea of composing a one-act opera based on that mythical story.