“Wherever you open the score, you can feel the wind blowing at you,” commented an elderly fellow composer of Richard Wagner’s The Flying Dutchman (Der fliegende Holländer), and indeed this observation, intended as a criticism, perfectly sums up one of the greatest strengths of the romantic opera that debuted in 1843: the perception of unbridled natural forces, the storm and the sea, which lend the work its unique character.

The opera was inspired by a tempestuous sea trip in the summer of 1839, when Wagner – having lost his post as conductor at the Riga Court Theatre and fleeing his creditors – embarked on a sea voyage with his wife. Due this the horrendous storm they were forced at one point to take shelter on the Norwegian coast. Two years later the opera was completed in Paris, exactly eight months after he began working on it.

The opera, directed by János Szikora, is presented in the original, 1841, draft version in a single act.

Opera in one act (original version)

Further dates:  26. March 19:00 , 28. March 19:00 , 30. March 19:00 , 01. April 19:00 , 03. April 19:00 , 05. April 19:00

Source: Hungarian State Opera House
Address: 1061 Budapest Andrassy ave. 22.