A battle of the sexes with plenty to please public and purists

Mozart's ' Marriage of Figaro'is a masterpiece with comic twists worthy of Shakespeare, writes Eileen Battersby

HAPPILY EVER AFTER is a difficult enough concept to contemplate, but when all a man wants to do is prevent his boss having his way with his bride-to-be, as well as avoid having to marry another woman old enough to be his mother, well, that is when complicated becomes almost insurmountable. Still, our hero is resourceful, his bride-to-be even more so - all of which ensures that Le Nozzze di Figaro (The Marriage of Figaro), the earliest of Mozart's Italian masterpieces, remains one of the finest, most human and liveliest works in the operatic repertoire, with sufficient comic confusion and scheming to satisfy Shakespeare, never mind Dickens.

Mozart's glorious score, with its silvery harpsichord, rich set pieces and sustained quality of apparently spontaneous melody, does justice to Lorenzo Da Ponte's engaging libretto based on the play by the French playwright and sometime spy Pierre Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais. That French original, one of three plays in the Figaro of Almaviva trilogy which includes Le Barbier de Séville(1775) (which would later inspire Rossini's 1816 opera), is a complicated work that was not only a comedy but something of a revolutionary polemic. The politics would have offended the Austrian emperor had this aspect not been removed. Da Ponte - formerly a disgraced student priest but the court poet at the time of his collaborations with Mozart - instead concentrated on simplifying the original text.

That said, the plot is sufficiently complicated to facilitate vivid characterisation. Da Ponte presented Mozart with a yarn looking at the many faces of love, ranging from its most light-hearted, to the adolescent longing of the count's page Cherubino, to the count's rampaging lust, to playful romance as personified by Susanna and Figaro, as well as his jealous love. There is also an inspired element: love lost as so eloquently expressed in Countess Rosina's two beautiful arias: "Porgi amor" and "Dove sono i bei momenti".

First performed at the Burgtheater in Vienna on May 1st, 1786 when Mozart was 30, it was a great success. He conducted from the harpsichord and on that opening night many of the arias, duets and even the choruses had to be encored. The finales to Acts 11 and IV are exhilarating crowd pleasers. On the third night, there were seven encores, and one duet was sung three times - all of which added considerably to the length of a three-hour work. The audience obviously didn't mind, it was demanding the encores. However, on the morning after that third performance, the emperor hurriedly rushed through a royal edict limiting encores to solo arias. Some maintained that the emperor had been pressed to do this by parties envious of Mozart - Mozart anecdotes tend to have sinister subplots.

Even without encores The Marriage of Figarois substantial, yet such is the music and the pace that few evenings are more enjoyable. The versatile British company Armonico Consort, which brings its production to Dublin this weekend, plans to highlight this exuberance. According to Armonico Consort founder and artistic director Christopher Monks, Figaro was not written for the landed gentry, it was written for the ordinary punter, "We want to be faithful to Mozart's enthusiasm and love of people." Founded as a choir in Warwick in 2000, Armonico Consort has evolved into a diverse music company with a strong youth education base catering for more than 10,000 children each year. To date it has recorded six CDs, and has a wide repertoire, performing early Renaissance and baroque music as well as giving chamber recitals and concerts. Since 2005 it has been increasingly drawn to opera. Its first production, Purcell's The Fairy Queen, led to a touring production of Purcell's' King Arthur.

Armonico Consort brought an attractive Die Zauberflöteto the Helix in early April, sung in English and highlighting the humour and magic through some playful flourishes. The staging was sophisticated and graceful, deferring to the original conventions. Most impressive of all was the vocal talent which did overshadow the sound of the orchestra. This company, which returns with a larger orchestra for Figaro, should also bring its light, witty touch to the quick sliver pacing of an opera which claims many of Mozart's catchiest operatic flourishes as well as an array of chaotic subplots.

The action, originally set in 18th-century Seville, has this time been fast-forwarded to the 1950s, with an English country house emphasising the upstairs-downstairs tensions as most of the characters attempt to deal with the count. Performed in English, it takes place over the course of what should be Figaro's wedding day. At first he thinks all is well and he praises the generosity of Count Almavia who has given the happy couple a bedroom. But Susanna, whose shrewd intelligence is obvious from the opening scene, knows otherwise.

Figaro is alert to the count's antics, but he has another problem. Having borrowed money from Marcellina, the doctor's housekeeper, he knows that unless he pays it back that lady, old enough to be his mother, intends on marrying him. The old doctor, who has a grudge against Figaro - dating from The Barber of Seville when Figaro assisted the Count in his bid to marry Rosina, thus foiling the doctor's interest in her dowry - is hopeful of revenge.

Meanwhile, into this witty exploration of love's many faces enters the young page Cherubino who is so in love with love that he reckons he loves all women, especially the Countess Rosina. The youth, performed by a mezzo, is telling Susanna about his infatuation when the count enters, ready to flirt with her. Intent on getting rid of Cherubino, the count despatches him to his regiment.

Should the audience relax into comic complicity, the Countess Rosina, alone in her bedroom, sings "Porgi amor" her lament at having lost the count's love. Meanwhile, the count is planning to marry Figaro off to old Marcellina, but Figaro launches a series of manoeuvres.

Such is the speed of the plot - and the plotting between the characters, most of whom have something against the count. There are hitches: a pin is lost, identities confused and Figaro, in desperation when faced with marriage to the older woman, announces that he is of gentle birth and requires permission to wed from his parents. His parents turn out to be none other than Marcellina and the old doctor, her employer. Confused? Good. Figaro's parents belatedly marry - and he and Susanna do too, while the countess forgives her lusty idiot of a husband, who is just that, never a true villain. Therein lies the message of the opera, love solves everything.

The Marriage of Figarois about social class. It is also a battle of the sexes without the shrillness; there is no real taxing and proving. Yet there are tests: the testing of the young love shared by Susanna and Figaro, and the older, more battered love of the countess for the count. Above all, it is a good-natured ensemble piece, with none of the stylishly contrived cynicism of the later Così Fan Tutte(1790), a much colder and more knowing work. With The Marriage of Figaro Mozart elevated the Italian comic opera formula to new heights of humour and three-dimensional characterisation. It remains one of the most beloved of operas which pleases the public as entertainment, balances plot with catchy tunes and possesses sufficient great music to beguile the purist.

The Marriage of Figarois at the Helix Theatre, Dublin, on Saturday and Sunday