It's going to be another big production by Slaithwaite Philharmonic Orchestra.

They have gained a reputation for totally transforming Huddersfield Town Hall for their operatic productions and they are doing it again next weekend.

Their opener for the new 2013-2014 season is another fully costumed and staged opera production. It will be on Saturday, October 19, and starts at 7pm.

Eagerly anticipated after two successful productions of Puccini operas, this year director Keith Cheetham and conductor Benjamin Ellin turn to the mystical drama of Wagner’s Flying Dutchman.

Franz Lachner, the opera’s first Munich conductor, said that whenever he opened the Dutchman score “a wind seemed to blow out at him.”

In this 200th anniversary year of Richard Wagner’s birth, Slaithwaite Philharmonic Orchestra in association with Focus Opera brings to Huddersfield a new specially adapted version of Wagner’s thrilling and at times chilling romantic story of love and redemption set to an exhilarating score.

The idea for an opera based on the legendary tale may have ‘blown’ into Wagner’s mind during a journey to London in 1839 when a heavy storm blew up around his ship and they had to put into shelter. 

However it came about, Wagner creates magnificent and furious stormy seascapes full of colour and drama that reflect and heighten the mental agony and neurosis within the two main characters, Senta and The Dutchman.

It is set in a small Yorkshire fishing village in the late 1950s and early 1960s. It’s a village with a small close community hemmed in by the harshness of the elements and the hardship of everyday life. The sea gives them their livelihood, but also claims their souls all too readily. Legends and supernatural tales are everywhere.

Sarah Helsby Hughes (Tosca from last year’s SPO production of Tosca) sings the role of Senta.

A woman longing for romantic love and freedom from the closed society she lives in, she is finally driven to make the ultimate sacrifice. Terence den Dulk, (Scarpia from Tosca) takes the role of the doomed Dutchman, full of fury, yet weary from his endless search for redemption by the fidelity of a woman’s love.

Sarah hails from Liverpool, and studied at the Birmingham Conservatoire of Music. Since graduation, her career has taken her all over the world, including performances in Europe, the USA and Japan. She has appeared for many opera companies, including Mid-Wales Opera, Carl Rosa Opera, Lyric Opera Dublin, D’Oyly Carte Opera Company, Opera North, Opera Ireland, Pavilion Opera, Focus Opera and City of Birmingham Touring Opera

Since 2011, Sarah has been the artistic director of Heritage Opera, responsible for producing, translating, and directing most of the company’s output.

Australian-born Terence has performed in numerous concerts in his native country, appearing as bass soloist in Handel’s Messiah, Bach’s St John’s Passion and Christmas Oratorio, Verdi’s Requiem, Vaughan Williams’ Five Mystical Songs, and Shostakovich’s Symphony no. 14. 

He has performed live nationally on ABC Classic FM and has sung at the Sydney Opera House, appearing as guest artist with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra at their annual New Year’s Gala concert.

Terence came to the UK to study at the National Opera studio in London.

This is music and drama on an epic scale, performed by the Slaithwaite Philharmonic with a cast of international singers and chorus.

Tickets priced £15 to £20 (concessions £12) are available from Kirklees Box Offices on 01484 223200.

As always children accompanied by adults are admitted free to the area and gallery.

Benjamin Ellin will lead a discussion about the music at 6.15pm in the main concert hall.