The Steersman calls out. A prosperous south wind is blowing! Let the sailors man their stations, and soon they will be home. The Dutchman advises Daland to sail ahead, since his crew is weary and needs rest; his ship is swift, and will arrive soon. Daland boards his ship, where the sailors are lustily singing of their homecoming and preparing the ship to heave anchor. Daland gives the signal with a whistle, and they sail away, singing. The Dutchman pensively boards his ship.
Comment: Another lusty chorus brings this act to a vocal end, but the last word is the orchestra’s. We hear themes associated with ocean life, which the Norwegian sailors are now plying but the Dutchman is merely contemplating. There’s no good dramatic reason to have the Dutchman remain behind while Daland sets sail—indeed, he never even asked directions, so to speak, to Daland’s village. (The great Wagner scholar Ernest Newman [1868–1959], who will be referred to frequently throughout this book, suggests Wagner had the Dutchman remain so he could make an impressive solo entrance in Act II. Was Newman on drugs when he wrote this? The Dutchman makes his entrance with Daland!) Still, the effect in performance is subtle and excellent. The Norwegians are singing as they set sail, but the Dutchman seems to have the sea, and all its music, inside of himself at this point.
Act II
Setting: A large room in Daland’s house. On the wall hangs a portrait of a mysterious, pale man in a black Spanish outfit—the legendary Flying Dutchman.
The maidens of the village are gathered, spinning at their wheels. Mary urges them on their work, that they may get gifts from their boyfriends when they return from the sea. Senta does not spin with the others, but sits in a chair with her arms folded, gazing pensively at the portrait of the Dutchman. Mary, a somewhat older maid who seems to be in charge, tells Senta to sing and spin with the others. The girls tease Senta: she has no need to work, since her boyfriend is Erik the poor hunter, who will only bring her game instead of the baubles they hope to get from their sailors.
Comment: This is irreverently known in opera circles as the Forty Fat Fräuleins scene, and can easily descend into parody.
Spinning songs were a standard of bygone days, since the work was dreadfully dull, and the whirr and clanks of the spinning wheel lent themselves well to musical accompaniment. Liszt made a brilliant piano transcription of this chorus, which was, for a while, considerably more popular than this opera.
While the music comes across well if there are actual spinning wheels on stage, some productions do not trust Wagner’s orchestra to re-create the sounds of the wheels, and put so many of the contraptions on stage that it sounds like a small industrial plant.
Senta sings a snippet of ballad to herself while staring at the portrait, making Mary complain that Senta is dreaming her youth away staring at that image. Senta sighs. The Dutchman’s story is so sad. Why did Mary ever tell it to her? The girls tease her more. She’d better be careful! Erik is hot-blooded, and may get jealous of the picture! Senta angrily tells them to be quiet, but they just laugh and spin faster, as if to drown her out. She jumps out of her chair and tells the girls to quit their dumb song. If they want her to join them, they’ll have to sing something better. She asks Mary to sing the Ballad of the Flying Dutchman, but when Mary declines, she says she will sing it herself. Let the girls listen carefully to the words! Mary defiantly declares that she will continue to spin while the others listen.
Comment: This is what’s called a set-up, saying “I’m now going to sing an important song and everybody had better listen!” In later years, when Wagner had learned to make set arias look more like an organic part of the whole, he was slightly embarrassed by this sort of thing in the Dutchman.
Senta, still in the armchair, sings sea calls, as if to herself. Have you seen the ship on the ocean with black masts and blood red sails? The ship’s master, a pale man, keeps watch without a break, through the howling wind whistling in the rigging, flying like an arrow without aim, end, or rest! Yet he could be saved if he finds a woman who will be true to him until death. Pray to heaven that he find her!
Senta turns toward the portrait. Once, the captain tried to round a cape during a violent storm. In madness he swore to round it if it took all eternity! Ho! And Satan heard him, Hoi-ho! And held him to his word! Now he roams eternally. Yet he could be saved, if he finds the path that God’s angel once showed him. Pray to heaven that he find the true woman!
The other girls are now listening in rapt attention, repeating the prayer. Senta, who has risen from her chair, becomes more excited as she approaches the picture. Every seven years the captain goes ashore, and every seven years he has been foiled by faithlessness. Ho! Off to sea, Hoi-ho! Heave anchor, no end, no rest! Senta collapses in her chair. The girls continue the song. Where will he find the true woman?
Comment: Wagner wrote that Senta’s ballad was the germ from which he developed the entire opera. It is a strange and wonderful piece. Senta sings most of it not in the typical diva fashion, full voice with arms flailing, but in a sort of repressed intensity. It sounds somehow far away. The sea calls, especially, make her sound as if she is some kind of echo of the sailors we heard in the first act.
Like the Dutchman, she has a lot of character to establish in her first big vocal moment. Most of the time, Senta is played as a garden variety wide-eyed nut-case. The great Sentas have done more with the role, making her a sensitive woman in a claustrophobic society who connects with the sea as the one limitless feature of her life. For another girl in her position, the father would be an obvious object of nautical fantasy projections, but we’ve already met Senta’s father, and he’s simply not the kind of guy any imaginative person could project fantasies onto.
As if possessed, Senta leaps up from the chair, saying she is the one who will save the Dutchman! The girls cry out for help, for just then Erik has entered the room and heard Senta’s insane plea. “Senta,” he cries, “will you destroy me?” Mary exclaims that the picture will go right out the door as soon as Daland returns. Erik says gloomily that Daland is coming; Senta, who has been motionless, starts at the news. The girls are thrilled to see their boyfriends again, and Mary, fussing as always, tells them their work isn’t done. There’s food to be cooked, and a hundred details to attend to. She and the other girls run out of the house.
Comment: Well, Wagner had to get everybody out of the house somehow, didn’t he?
Senta is eager to run down to the dock, but Erik detains her. What is she doing to him? He has offered her father his faithful heart, his small possessions, and his hunter’s skill for Senta’s hand. Will she accept that? She begs to leave. Does Erik doubt her heart? Why such distrust? Erik says Daland only wants money. Can Erik trust Senta to plead for him, when her heart seems infatuated with the portrait on the wall, and consumed with the ballad she has just sung again? Senta evades him. She’s but a child; she doesn’t know what she sings. Does Erik fear a portrait and a song? He asks if she hasn’t given him good reason to fear them. But shouldn’t the poor Dutchman’s fate move her? asks Senta. Shouldn’t my own fate move you? counters Erik. She leads him to the picture, chiding him for comparing himself to the Dutchman. See the deep grief that looks down on her from the portrait. Alas! cries Erik. Satan has trapped Senta! Deeply troubled, Erik must now confide his dream to her. As Senta, exhausted, falls back into the armchair in a trance, Erik tells her he was lying dreaming on a cliff over the sea when he suddenly saw a strange ship approach. As he relates his vision, Senta, in her trance, appears to be having the dream herself. Two men came on shore. One was Daland. The other? asks Senta, with eyes closed. Erik recognized the other from his pale face and black outfit. He points to the portrait. Then Senta came and clasped the stranger’s knees. He raised me up, interjects Senta, and then? Then, Erik says, he saw Senta and the stranger go out to sea. Senta suddenly awakes from her trance. She must see him! Erik exclaims that Senta is lost to him, and runs out of the room in despair.
Comment: Erik, more than anyone else in this opera, actually d
evelops as a character, and this is reflected, albeit subtly, in his music. He begins with a standard love song, saying “I still want to marry you and have a nice home,” and so on. His second verse, where he voices his concerns about Daland and even Senta, is sung to the same melody, but there is opportunity to let the voice show that doubt has crept in. When he relates his vision, his music wanders a bit beyond the standard form of equal measures with stresses in the same place. By Act III, he will be clearly seen as almost beyond self-control. This development often goes unnoticed in productions, in which Erik is seldom taken seriously.
After her excitement, Senta stares at the portrait and sings the prayer refrain of her ballad. Pray heaven, that soon a true wife … Suddenly, the door opens. It is her father … with the Dutchman! The pale captain enters the room. He and Senta stare at each other, transfixed and silent.
Comment: This is one of opera’s all-time great “boy-meets-girl” moments, although the effect should really be of two people who already know each other in some sense. They remain motionless and completely lost in each other, except when Senta briefly greets her father, through the rest of the scene until Daland leaves and they begin their duet.
Daland carefully approaches Senta. Is she not happy to see him? Finally she greets her father. But who is the stranger? He explains the stranger is a seaman like himself, who has been away from home for a long time, traveling to many lands, where he has amassed great wealth. The stranger will pay handsomely for hospitality. Would it displease Senta to have him stay with them? She barely nods her approval, unable to speak.
Daland asks the Dutchman if he has overpraised his daughter, or is she not an ornament to her sex? The Dutchman, also unable to speak, nods in assent. Daland continues that the guest has also asked to marry Senta. If she likes him, he will marry her the next day. He shows his daughter some jewelry, assuring her that the Dutchman has plenty more. She can have it all if she marries him. But Senta has no eye for the jewelry; she hardly even notices her father. She and the Dutchman remain with gazes locked on each other. Daland finally begins to understand that he is not particularly wanted in the room, and says goodbye for the moment. He walks to the door slowly, watching the pair, very pleased by their attraction, and more than a little pleased with himself as well.
Comment: Daland’s aria here is a lovely, soaring number typical of the German Romantics, such as Weber or even Beethoven. Daland’s nature is utterly and fundamentally at odds with the two people on either side of him. When he poses his questions to them, he is musically answered only by soft taps of the kettledrum. Senta and the Dutchman are little else than human heartbeats at this point.
The Dutchman and Senta continue to stare at each other for some time without speaking.
Comment: Musical commentators don’t have a very high opinion of this moment. Newman, for one, complains that the youthful Wagner could think of no other way to portray the underlying tensions of these two than continuing the soft kettledrum beats, peppered with soft recollections of the Dutchman’s theme and the redemption theme. Perhaps this is not on the same musical plane as, say, the analogous scene in Tristan und Isolde, but it works in the theater, especially if the two performers are capable of creating tension without moving a muscle. The audience tends to remember this moment. It is impressive, in a Zen sort of way, for its near-nothingness.
The Dutchman softly breathes his thoughts. Is this love? Did Satan leave him a heart just to torture him? Or is it a longing for release from his curse, a longing for salvation? Senta tries to understand if she is dreaming or waking. Can she really be this man’s instrument of salvation? The Dutchman asks if Senta is not opposed to her father’s choice. Can she be true forever? She insists she can. They both pray this may be so. The Dutchman says that if she knew the fate that awaits her if she joins him, she would flee. Senta staunchly replies that she knows a woman’s sacred duty, and swears fidelity to the Dutchman unto death with all her heart. The two exclaim joy at this, he at last beginning to feel the possibility of redemption, she feeling a new empowerment through her vow.
Comment: This is the time for our two lead singers to “give voice,” and they must do so in a number of different ways. When they begin, they rhapsodize about each other in the same sort of quietly intense measures Senta had used at the beginning of her ballad. When the Dutchman speaks of the fate that awaits Senta, we hear full-blooded sea music. The last part of the duet is a rush of passion, with all the vocalizing operagoers can expect from such a set-up. It can be orgasmically cathartic.
Daland walks in, saying that the villagers are gathering for a feast to celebrate the sailors’ return. May he tell them there is a wedding to be celebrated as well? The Dutchman and Senta each nod, and the three rejoice. Senta solemnly gives her hand, the Dutchman defies all hell now that a woman loves him, and Daland urges them to the feast.
Comment: Daland’s reentrance here really is a bit much, with its “So, tell me, what have you two decided?” air, but we need him in order to have a rousing bass/bass-baritone/soprano trio. Senta’s voice soars over the men’s, creating a sympathy for this woman who is bursting loose at last.
Act III
Setting: The harbor, with the houses of the village in the background. Daland’s ship is at the dock, with sailors aboard drinking. The Dutchman’s ship is next to it, enveloped in eerie gloom.
The sailors aboard Daland’s ship are drinking and dancing, celebrating their return home.
Comment: The Sailors’ Chorus is a straightforward, fun, and entirely hummable piece of music, snippets of which we have heard in the Overture and in Act I. The stage directions indicate that the sailors are to be dancing clumsily, stamping their feet at the stresses of each measure. It’s hard to know exactly what effect Wagner was intending, because in actual performance the good gentlemen of the chorus invariably look like idiots and sound like a cattle stampede.
The girls of the village arrive at the dockside with baskets of food and drink. They comment that the sailors seem to be having a good party without their help, but the sailors call for them to stay. The girls offer refreshment, saying they should send some over to their neighbors, the Dutchmen’s crew. Daland’s crew say the Dutch are still sleeping, exhausted from their voyage, but the girls are curious, and call to the Dutch. They are answered by total silence. The Norwegian sailors joke that the Dutch, apparently, are dead, and don’t need food and drink. The girls try again. Don’t the Dutch boys have girlfriends on shore? Aren’t they hungry or thirsty? The Norwegian sailors join forces with the girls, calling for the Dutch to wake up. Silence again. The girls grow fearful: these sailors truly are dead! Daland’s crew joke that this ship must be the legendary Flying Dutchman. Indeed, it looks just like it! Then let them be, advise the girls. There’s no need to wake the dead. The Norwegians taunt the Dutch. How many years have they been afloat? The girls back away from the dock, afraid. They hand their baskets to Daland’s crew, saying they’ll return later, and run off. Daland’s crew descend on the baskets, eating, drinking, and singing their song.
As they sing, there are stirrings aboard the Dutchman’s ship. A blue light glows out of it. Although remaining calm elsewhere, the sea begins to churn just around the Dutchman’s ship, and a wind blows through its rigging. The ghost crew becomes visible, and they sing about their captain. He is on land again, hoi-ho! The blonde maiden swears to him, hoi-ho! But she will leave him. Captain, you are not lucky in love! Their ship tosses about, though Daland’s is calm. Daland’s crew are frightened at the ghost chorus, and try to drown them out with their own song, but they cannot conquer the Dutch. Terrified, the Norwegians flee below deck, crossing themselves as they run. The Dutch ghost marks this with a shrill, mocking laugh, and a deathly calm descends on the scene as before.
Comment: The double chorus is pure gangbuster opera at its best, and justification, if any were necessary, for the unaffected simplicity of the Sailors’ Chorus. The ghost chorus has an airy quality, blowing over and righ
t through the coarser Norwegians’ simple tune.
This scene also provides the production team a good opportunity to pull out all the necessary stops to portray the point of conflict between the worlds of the living and the dead.
Senta runs out of her house, pursued by Erik. He asks what evil power has led her astray. Daland’s betrayal he could understand, but Senta’s? Conflicted, she says she must do her sacred duty, but Erik asks what of her duty to him, when she led him to believe she would marry him? She asks, in her confusion, if she had sworn eternal faith to Erik, and he asks how she can deny it. He speaks lovingly of happier days they shared. When she put her arms around his neck and clasped his hand, wasn’t that a promise?
Comment: Poor Erik. Everybody complains about his lovely aria here. Indeed, he shuts down the action pretty effectively with his old-fashioned cavatina, but that’s the point exactly. Without Erik’s aria, all the action in Act III would be in the realm of the supernatural, and this story is about the clash of this world and the next. The real problem is that Wagner had not yet become as deft at this balancing act as he would in later years, and Erik’s aria does strike us as a bit of a comedown.
The Dutchman has appeared unnoticed and has heard the end of Erik’s declaration of love. “Lost,” cries the Dutchman. “Salvation is lost forever!” Senta tries to stop him, but the Dutchman boards his ship and orders the crew to put out to sea. Despite Senta’s protests, he gives a loud whistle and takes his leave of the land forever. Senta insists she will keep her vow, the Dutchman declares he no longer believes in her or in God, while Erik begs Senta to save herself, since she is clearly possessed by Satan.
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