Poise and Elegance in a Rare Revival

Lanyi Yan, Ceallachán McDonald, Abbey McGiff and Evan Myles Byrne in RIAM's production of Haydn's 'La vera costanza' (Photo: Mark Stedman)

Poise and Elegance in a Rare Revival

The Royal Irish Academy of Music presented Haydn's opera 'La vera costanza' at the Samuel Beckett Theatre on 14–18 January. Brendan Finan reviews.
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Across almost three decades from 1761 to 1790, Joseph Haydn’s career was based in the court of Prince Nikolaus Esterházy, a period across which he refined what became concretised forms such as the symphony, the string quartet, and others. What’s perhaps less well-known is that part of Haydn’s duties for Esterhazy included running an opera troupe, which staged work by the composer as well as others. And though nowadays Haydn is probably mainly thought of as a composer of instrumental music (with the exception of his oratorios The Creation and The Seasons), his productions for Esterházy included almost two dozen original operas. He first wrote the comic drama La vera costanza (‘True Constancy’) in 1779, and having lost much of the manuscript in a fire, rewrote it largely from memory for a revival in 1785.

The opera’s been recorded in its entirety only once, in 1977, so the performances last week by the Royal Irish Academy of Music at the Samuel Beckett Theatre at Trinity College was a rare chance to see it in full. Produced in collaboration with Design for Film from the Institute of Art, Design and Technology Dún Laoghaire, which oversaw the visuals, the opera was performed four times by two largely distinct casts, in the case of the Friday 17 January performance led by sopranos Kelsie Irving as Rosina and Lanyi Yan as the Baroness, accompanied by the RIAM Opera Orchestra conducted by Andrew Synnott. 

Evan Myles Byrne, Kelsie Irving and Lanyi Yan (Photo: Mark Stedman)

The staging used the overture to introduce the characters going about their lives, and to establish in pantomime some important details for later, with the surtitles – like silent movie intertitles – telling us the characters’ names and details that couldn’t be easily shown on stage (like the Baroness setting out to sea). A storm and shipwreck follows, where the nobility are helped ashore by some locals, including the fisherman Masino (baritone Boyu Liu). The Baroness has barely dried off by the time she suggests to Rosina, the fisherman’s sister, that she would make a good wife for the slow-witted fop Villotto (bass Ceallachán McDonald). The Baroness suspects, correctly, that her nephew Count Errico (tenor Rory Lynch) is in love with Rosina, and wants to avert that marriage. She does not know that Errico and Rosina are already secretly married, and (though Errico doesn’t know this yet) have a child. Rounding out the main cast are Lisetta (soprano Abbey McGiff), the Baroness’s maid, quietly in love with Masino, and Ernesto (tenor Evan Myles Byrne), a nobleman who wishes to marry the Baroness though the latter has said she won’t marry until her nephew is married.

So the stage is set for a largely comic opera, with the normal tropes deployed in fun ways. Characters lurk in the background misunderstanding foreground conversations, mistake motivations, or come into contrived conflict. The young cast had no reservations about leaning into the comic side of the performance, prancing or flouncing or exaggerating expressions. One memorable scene near the end of the first act had Villotto – who wants to marry Rosina – and Masino – who doesn’t want the wedding to go ahead – in duet. Watching them from hiding places are Errico, who has threatened to kill Villotto if he marries Rosina, and Ernesto, who has threatened to kill Masino if the wedding is cancelled.

Musically the work sparkles with Haydn’s energy and wit, assured in structure and well balanced between lighter and more dramatic material. So much attention is given nowadays to Mozart’s operas that it’s a shame other composers of his time don’t have their work performed more frequently, and while Haydn is now thought of mainly as an instrumental composer, his skill at writing interesting music for the voice is on display here, especially in the busy ensemble finales of each act.

The cast of La vera costanza (Photo: Mark Stedman)

Vital for audiences and performers
La vera costanza is a good choice for student opera, with the music providing challenges for the performers without being too taxing for multiple performances, and while there were some faults on the night, there was also some beautiful singing. In particular soprano Kelsie Irving’s Rosina, at the dramatic heart of the story, provides an earnest contrast to the opera’s more farcical elements, and her performance was warm and confident. The tenors Rory Lynch and Evan Myles Byrne, as Errico and Ernesto respectively, performed their parts well (the latter with an amusing physicality), and soprano Lanyi Yan’s consistent vibrato made the Baroness appropriately distinct.

For me, there’s a particular kind of poise and elegance to Classical-era singing that is rarely found elsewhere, and always rewarding. This work caught my attention as much because it’s so little performed – I’d never heard it – as for any other reason. And while I’ve seen a number of impressive professional operas in recent years (from Michael Gallen’s collectivist Elsewhere to Emma O’Halloran’s Mary Motörhead and Trade), smaller amateur and pre-professional productions such as this are vital for audiences and performers alike.

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Nagaer Ha, Ashton Murphy, Éadaoin Hassett and Evan Myles Byrne (Photo Mark Stedman)

Published on 23 January 2025

Brendan Finan is a teacher and writer. Visit www.brendanfinan.net.

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