Haydn, Joseph, 1732-1809. Isola disabitata

L'isola disabitata (English: The Uninhabited Island), Hob. 28/9, is an opera (azione teatrale in due parti) by Joseph Haydn, his tenth opera, written for the Eszterházy court and premiered on 6 December 1779. The libretto is the only one by Metastasio set by Haydn. The libretto had been originally set by Giuseppe Bonno (1754, Vienna) and subsequently used by Manuel García. Nino Rota has set excerpts to music as well. The libretto was adapted into French and set by F. I. Beck in Bordeaux in the same year as Haydn as L'isle déserte. A later German version was as a Singspiel Die wüste Insel (Hob. XXVIII:9). Haydn's work has long been remembered for its dramatic Sturm und Drang overture, but the rest of the opera did not see print until H. C. Robbins Landon's 1976 edition (only available for rental). A new edition by Thomas J Busse was prepared in 2007 and is now online. The piece is striking for its use of orchestral recitativo accompagnato throughout. Unrelated to Metastasio there is also a libretto of the same title by Carlo Goldoni (using the pen name Polisseno Fegeio), set by Giuseppe Scarlatti in 1757; it concerns a Chinese woman and Dutch sailors and was revived in 1760 (and again in Vienna in 1773) under the title La cinese smarrita.