The first person to use the term opera in history was Liu Xun (1240-1319) of the Song Dynasty. He proposed "Yongjia Opera" in "The Biography of the Poet Wu Yongzhang". What he called "Yongjia Opera" is later generations The so-called "Southern Opera", "Xi Wen" and "Yongjia Zaju". Starting from Wang Guowei in modern times, "opera" was used as a general name for traditional Chinese drama culture. ,
Traditional opera is one of the traditional Chinese arts. It has many interesting types of dramas. The performances include singing and dancing, speaking and singing, literature and martial arts. It integrates "singing, acting, reading and fighting". It is famous in the world of drama. It is unique in history. Its main characteristics, taking Peking Opera as a culmination of classical opera art as an example, are: first, men pretend to be women (in Yue opera, it is common for women to pretend to be men); second, they divide the four professions of raw, dan, jing, and ugly; third, they There is an exaggerated make-up art - facial makeup; the fourth is "outfits" (that is, opera costumes and props) have basically fixed styles and specifications; the fifth is the use of "programs" for performances. Chinese national operas range from the pre-Qin dynasty actors, the Han Dynasty's "Hundred Operas", the Tang Dynasty's "Joining the Army Opera", the Song Dynasty's Zaju, the Southern Song's Southern Opera, the Yuan Dynasty's Zaju, to the unprecedented prosperity of local operas and the formation of Peking Opera in the Qing Dynasty. After the mid-Tang Dynasty, Chinese drama developed rapidly and drama art gradually took shape.
The prosperity of literature and art in the Tang Dynasty was the result of high-level economic development, which promoted the independence of opera art and provided rich nutrition to opera art. The rhythm of poetry and the maturity of narrative poetry gave opera decisiveness. Influence. The prosperity of music and dance provides the strongest performance and singing foundation for opera. The professional research and formal training of Jiaofang Liyuan have improved the artistic level of the artists, accelerated the dramatization process of song and dance, and produced a number of opera repertoires that use song and dance to tell stories. By the Yuan Dynasty, "Zaju" had greatly developed on the original basis and became a new type of drama. It possesses the basic characteristics of drama and marks the entry of Chinese drama into a mature stage. From the mid-12th century to the early 13th century, professional art and commercial performance groups gradually emerged, as well as Yuan dramas and Jinyuan dramas that reflected citizens' lives and opinions, such as "The Injustice of Dou E" by Guan Hanqing and "Autumn in the Han Palace" by Ma Zhiyuan. and works such as "The Revenge of the Orphans of the Zhao Family". This period was a prosperous period for the opera stage.
Yuan Zaju is not only a mature and advanced form of drama, but also is regarded as the mainstream of literature of the generation because it is the most characteristic of the times and the most artistically original. Yuan Zaju was initially centered in Dadu (today's Beijing) and became popular in the north. After the Yuan Dynasty destroyed the Southern Song Dynasty, it developed into a national drama. The theater world of the Yuan Dynasty was full of stars and masterpieces.
The Yuan Dynasty drama flourished for a generation, and artistic development and social reality provided opportunities from two aspects. From the perspective of the development of art itself, drama has accumulated a lot of accumulation after a long gestation and slow process, and has reached maturity in both internal structure and external performance. It was precisely at this time that traditional poetry began to decline after experiencing its heyday and glory in the Tang and Song Dynasties. In the eyes of talented artists, the Theater Arts is a new land waiting for them to cultivate. From the perspective of social reality, the Yuan and Mongolian rulers abolished the imperial examination system, which not only cut off the possibility of intellectuals entering official careers, but also demoted them to a low status: only one level higher than beggars and below ordinary people and prostitutes. These highly educated and educated people were relegated to the bottom of society. Being alienated from classics and history and indifferent to poetry, they had no choice but to spend their time in Goulanwashe and seek a way out. As a result, the emerging Yuan dramas unexpectedly gained batch after batch of professional creators. They have an industry organization named "Book Club", and playwrights who join the Book Club are called "Mr. Book Club". These down-and-out literati cooperated and competed within the group, and jointly created the golden age of Chinese drama. Different from previous poems that tended to express subjective moods and interests, Yuan dramas took it upon themselves to broadly reflect society. Obviously, this is because the writers have lived in Luxiang villages for a long time and have a deep understanding and feeling of reality.
The script system of Yuan dramas is mostly composed of "four folds and one wedge". Four folds are paragraphs of four plots, just like writing an article that emphasizes inheritance and integration. The wedge is short and usually placed before the first fold, which is somewhat similar to the later "prologue". Yuan dramas are artistically based on singing and combined with oral performances. Each tune is composed of several pieces of the same palace tune connected into a suite. The whole set has only one rhyme and is sung by Zhengmo, who plays the male lead, or Zhengdan, who plays the female lead.
This kind of "one-person lead singer" can give full play to the expertise of singing art and vividly shape the image of the main characters. Nianbai is partly influenced by the tradition of joining the military drama, and often makes jokes and is full of humor. The unification of musical structure and drama structure to achieve institutional regularity shows that the art of Yuan Zaju is mature and perfect. When opera reached the Ming Dynasty, legends developed. The predecessor of the legend of the Ming Dynasty is Nan Opera in the Song and Yuan Dynasties (Nan Opera is the abbreviation of Nanqu Opera. It is an emerging drama form developed based on the Zaju of the Song Dynasty and combined with the tunes of the southern region. Wenzhou is its birthplace) . The structure of Southern opera is different from that of Northern opera: it is not restricted by four folds. After processing and improvement by literati, this short opera, which was originally not rigorous enough, finally turned into a quite complete long drama. For example, Gao Ming's "Pipa Ji" is a work that transitions from southern opera to legend. The theme of this work comes from folklore. It presents a story relatively completely and has a certain degree of drama. It was once known as the "ancestor of the resurgence of Southern Opera".
In the middle of the Ming Dynasty, a large number of legendary writers and scripts emerged, among which Tang Xianzu was the most successful. He wrote many legendary scripts throughout his life, and "The Peony Pavilion" is his masterpiece. Through the story of Du Liniang and Liu Mengmei's death, separation, and separation, the work praises the spirit of rebellion against feudal ethics, the pursuit of happy love, and the liberation of individuality. The author gives love the power of resurrection, which defeats the shackles of feudal ethics and achieves the final victory. This point had far-reaching social significance in a society firmly dominated by feudal ethics at that time. This play has been loved by readers and audiences for 300 years since it came out. To this day, fragments such as "Girl School" and "Dream" are still active on the stage of opera performances. In the middle of the Ming Dynasty in the 16th century, Kun Opera emerged in the south of the Yangtze River, and operas such as "Fifteen Guan" and "Zhan Huakui" emerged. The opera popular with farmers during this period was Yiyang Opera, which originated in Anhui and Jiangxi. Kun Opera was popular with the feudal upper class.
On the stage in the late Ming Dynasty, it became popular to perform excerpts of opera. The so-called excerpts refer to the excerpts from the complete legendary play with beginning and end. They are just some relatively independent fragments in the whole play, but in these fragments, the scenes are wonderful and the singing and acting are excellent. The emergence of excerpts is the result of the strong development of drama performing arts, and it is also the inevitable result of time and stage washing. After the audience is familiar with the plot, they can enjoy the performance skills of the excerpt. "Wandering in the Garden" and "Dream Startling" in "The Peony Pavilion", "Stepping on an Umbrella" and "Worshiping the Moon" in "The Story of the Moon Worship Pavilion", "Piano Picking" and "Chasing the Boat" in "The Story of the Hosta", etc. The excerpts have become high-quality products that audiences love to watch.
Most of the works written in the late Ming and early Qing dynasties were about heroes in the hearts of the people, such as Mu Guiying, Tao Sanchun, Zhao Kuangyin, etc. The local operas at this time mainly included Bangzi from the north and Pihuang from the south. Peking Opera was born on the basis of the high prosperity of local operas in the Qing Dynasty. During the Tongzhi and Guangxu years, the first generation of Peking Opera performing artists and masters of different schools appeared among the "Thirteen Peking Opera Masters of Tongguang", marking the maturity and prosperity of Peking Opera art. Soon Peking Opera developed all over the country, especially in Shanghai and Tianjin. Peking Opera became a widely influential opera type, pushing China's opera art to a new level.
Because the drama style of legends in the Ming Dynasty continued until the Qing Dynasty, it is also commonly called the legends of the Ming and Qing Dynasties. The legends of the Ming and Qing Dynasties inherited the Southern Opera system in form and were more complete. A script usually only has about 30 scenes, and is often divided into upper and lower parts; the writer also pays special attention to the compact structure and the interweaving of Kehun. The music of the legend also takes the form of a combination of tunes and tunes, but it has evolved compared to Nan opera. The one-fold opera is no longer limited to one palace tune; the number of tunes also depends on the needs of the plot; all characters on the stage can sing.
The legends of the Ming and Qing Dynasties include many local dialects. Among them, the Kunshan and Yiyang dialects are the most widely spread and influential. Kunshan tune was reformed by Wei Liangfu (date of birth and death unknown) during the Jiajing period, and the "Shuimo tune" that was euphemistic, delicate, fluent and far-reaching was created, emphasizing clearness, integrity and purity of tune. Combining strings, flutes, and drumboards, a complete orchestra accompaniment is established. The performance of "Huan Sha Ji" made Kunshan dialect widely spread on the stage and became a national opera. Yiyang tune, which originated in Jiangxi, is mainly popular among the people. It is performed by Jianghu opera troupes. Every time it spreads to a place, it combines the local language and folk music and evolves into a local tune.
Yiyang tune does not require orchestral accompaniment, but only uses gongs and drums as the rhythm. One person sings in harmony with the others. It adopts the form of solo singing and accompanying tune. It is popular, folk and focuses on performance effects. It and the elegant and delicate style of Kunshan Opera form two different trends within Chinese opera. After a long period of stage practice in Ming Dynasty opera, the division of roles became more detailed. For example, there are 12 characters in Kunshan dialect. The protagonists are not limited to Zhengsheng and Zhengdan. Jing and Chou are also more than just teasers.
Comprehensive, virtual and procedural are the main artistic characteristics of Chinese opera. These characteristics embody the essence of the aesthetic thoughts of traditional Chinese culture and form a unique view of drama, making Chinese opera shine with its unique artistic brilliance on the big stage of world opera culture. Program is a form of expression in which opera reflects life. It refers to the standardized, dance-like performance of life movements and their repeated use. Programs come directly or indirectly from life, but they are formed by refining, summarizing, and beautifying life according to certain norms. It embodies the efforts of artists throughout the ages, and it has become the starting point for artistic re-creation by a new generation of actors, so that the art of opera performance can be passed down from generation to generation. Closing doors, pushing windows, mounting horses, boarding boats, going upstairs, etc. in opera performances all have a fixed format. In addition to performance procedures, opera has certain procedures in various aspects such as script form, role roles, music and singing, makeup and costumes, etc. Excellent artists can break through certain limitations of the program and create their own personalized standardized art. Program is a model of beauty.
Chinese opera is a dramatic form centered on the comprehensive performance of singing, reading, acting and fighting. It has rich means of artistic expression and its close integration with the performing arts makes Chinese opera special. charm. It integrates the beauty of lyrics, music, art and performance into one, uses rhythm to control it in one play, achieves harmonious unity, fully mobilizes the appeal of various artistic means, and forms a performance with distinctive rhythm unique to China. Art.
The most important feature of Chinese opera is virtuality. Stage art does not simply imitate life, but selects, refines, exaggerates and beautifies the prototype of life, bringing the audience directly into the palace of art.
Another artistic feature of Chinese opera is its formulaic nature, such as closing doors, mounting horses, and riding boats, etc., all have a set of fixed procedures. Programs in opera are both normative and flexible, so the art of opera is appropriately called free movement with rules.
Generally speaking, in the pre-art stage (that is, the primitive religious stage) of various ancient nations, the germination of various artistic factors were integrated. At the artistic stage, various European art types tend to gradually differentiate. For example, European dramas in the ancient Greek era had songs and dances. Later, after the reforms of Sophocles, Euripides and others, the song (dance) team gradually lost its role and became a simple drama using dialogue and action as means. . This kind of drama evolved from poetic dialogue to dialogue that completely imitated the language of life, and from poetic drama to drama. Song and dance are differentiated, and each has its own place in the entire drama field in the form of opera and dance drama.
The situation of Chinese opera is different. It always tends to be comprehensive, and it tends to be a synthesis of song, dance and drama. From the Qin Dynasty (221 BC - 206 BC) to the Han Dynasty (206 BC - 220 BC) as the early origin of Chinese opera, they experienced hundreds of operas in the Han Dynasty, and participated in military dramas in the Tang Dynasty (618-907), until the Southern Opera and Yuan Opera in the Song Dynasty (960-1279). Dynasty (1279-1368) Zaju, which is the development process of an art from simple to complex, from low-level to high-level. In this process, in order to spread all the colorful human life on a small stage, and in order to enable the people who usually live a monotonous and boring life to feel all kinds of unexpected spiritual stimulation while watching the drama, it constantly absorbs other things. Sister arts, such as poetry, music, dance, drawing, rap, acrobatics, martial arts and many other nutrients, have gradually become a comprehensive art that is inclusive and diverse. In other words, Chinese opera formed a dramatic style characterized by dialogue and action on the basis that various artistic elements such as literature (folk rap), music, and dance were fully developed and compatible with each other. The dialogues in Chinese opera are musical and the movements are dance-like, and the very nature of song and dance determines that its external form must be far away from life and mutate life, making it have the beauty of rhythm, rhythm, order, and harmony. The art of Chinese opera is further away from and mutated than ordinary singing and dancing.
The performers' makeup, costumes, and movement language have a sense of "pretentiousness and pretentiousness", and this is done to intensify, beautify, and artisticize ordinary language, daily movements, and ordinary emotions. For this reason, Chinese drama artists have long been trying to figure out the performance skills and functions of speaking, singing, dancing (body posture), and martial arts, and they have worked hard and never tired of it. Over time, they created, summarized, and accumulated a series of program actions that are exaggerated, expressive, normative, and fixed. If any actor steps onto the stage of Chinese opera and wants to perform "laughing", he must perform the "laughing" performance in accordance with the extremely exaggerated, expressive and standardized "laughing" procedural movements. This is true even today. Opera, which is far away from life forms, still takes life as the source of art. Because Chinese dramatists are both diligent in observing life and skilled in refining it, they can accurately and subtly depict the appearance and charm of characters, achieving both spirit and form.
Facial makeup, python robes, hat wings, feathers, sleeves, long beards, thick-soled boots, orchid hands, and strange weapons and props are all solidified into programs. With their touching beauty of decoration, color, shape and rhythm, they have effectively enhanced the artistic appeal of the performance and won the recognition and love of the Chinese audience.
There may be many reasons why Chinese opera art has to stay away from natural forms even with every frown and smile. However, the mass entertainment and commercial nature of this art and the weak material and economic conditions of theater troupes (troupes) are obviously important promoting factors. In ancient China, opera performances were often performed in squares, temples, grass terraces or courtyards. In towns and rural areas, theaters and markets were often combined. Thousands of spectators gathered, and the roar of people mixed with the noise of the stalls. Under such conditions and environment, in order to prevent the drama from being drowned in the noise, artists have to painstakingly seek effective means to highlight their presence and influence. It is this starting point of tenacious self-expression and self-expansion that leads them to explore the artistic rules of expressing life in a way far away from life: high-pitched and melodious singing accompanied by powerful gongs and drums, costumes inlaid with gold and embroidered silver, and embroidered red linings. Green facial makeup, fierce martial arts, long beard like rolling waves... The practical result of this law is not only the aesthetic effect that is pleasing to the eye and captivating. More importantly, the standardization of dance performance routines, the rhythm of music rhythm, the pattern decoration of stage art and character makeup, together with the rhythm of poetry in script literature, all together constitute the harmonious, rigorous and charming Chinese opera. Vivid and highly aesthetic cultural character. Since it is admitted that drama is drama, then the stage of Chinese opera pays attention to the truth and falsehood, and the "acting on the spot" of virtuality and reality clearly highlights the hypothetical nature of drama. This is not only different from the hallucinatory stage art processing principles that Western dramas have always adopted, but is completely opposite. When people in the West enter the theater, from the moment the curtain opens, the dramatist will do everything possible to use all possible stage methods to create the illusion of real life, so that the audience forgets that they are watching a play, and feels like they are actually there. The audience is generally immersed in the living environment and atmosphere created on the stage. For this reason, Western dramatists regard the stage as a relatively fixed space. Painting and modeling scenery create the prescribed scenes required by the drama. All disputes between characters are expressed, developed and resolved in this specific scene. In the same scene, the duration of the plot is generally consistent with the actual performance time perceived by the audience. This is the time and space view of the Western drama stage. Its theoretical basis is Aristotle's theory of imitation. Its support is the requirement that art truly reflect life.
In China, dramatists do not rely on stage technology to create the illusion of real life, do not ask whether the use of stage space meets the scale of life, and do not require that the plot time and the performance time are generally consistent. The Chinese opera stage is a stage that basically does not use scenery or equipment. The establishment of the stage environment is based on the activities of the characters. That is to say, only with the activities of characters can there be a certain environment; without the activities of characters, the stage is just an abstract space. The shape of time on the stage of Chinese opera is not relatively fixed. It is extremely detached, fluid, or very "elastic". If you want it to be long, be long, if you want to be short, be short. Long or short is entirely determined by the needs of the content.
Chinese opera, an extremely transcendent and flexible form of time and space, relies on the performing arts to create everything needed on the stage. The space and time suggested in the script are created with the specific dramatic situation created by the actor's performance, and are recognized by the audience.
The transcendent space-time form of Chinese opera, in addition to relying on virtual expression methods, is also related to the continuous structure of upper and lower fields. Actors exit from the upper stage door and exit from the lower stage door. The up and down and entry and exit are of great significance. It means a stage system that is different from the scene-based act in Western dramas. The entry and exit of actors and the entry and exit of characters on the stage realize the transformation of the dramatic environment and promote the development of the plot. For example, in the Peking Opera "The Female General of the Yang Family", Mu Guiying, who is holding a gun, comes from the upper gate in full swing. The stage is the school military field. At this time, she is already training soldiers and horses in the school field, and then she comes from the next door. Door back to the barracks. Chinese opera's up-and-down form combines actors' singing, chanting, and beating techniques with musical accompaniment to effectively express the changes in stage time, space, and atmosphere, making the stage present a flowing picture. In a scene, through the activities of the characters, one environment can be quickly and easily transferred to another. As long as the character shakes his whip and says: "A man walks a thousand miles, a horse crosses ten thousand mountains," the Chinese audience will immediately understand that he has traveled a thousand miles and came from one place to another.
The transcendent and flexible space-time form of Chinese drama is created by performing arts, because Chinese opera art has a complete set of virtual expression methods. This is the core reason.
Without any scenery or props, an opera actor can make the audience understand the situation in which the character he or she plays relies on his (her) meticulous movements to depict the image of the objective scenery. surroundings. For example, in the Huai opera "Sunflower" where Yanping calls the police, the kite turning routine is used to let the audience understand Yanping's sense of urgency in calling the police and the content of climbing over the mountains. It also allows the audience to understand what he (she) is really doing. What. Another example is the Jade Lotus in the Huai opera "The Edge of the Cabinet". She uses subtle virtual expressions to let the audience know what she is thinking and doing at a glance. ——So, the virtuality of this kind of performance is not only to use one's own movements to virtualize some objective object, but also to use this kind of object to express the psychological emotions of the characters in this specific environment. In this sense, the virtual method plays a positive role in integrating scene description and emotion. The virtual nature of Chinese opera gives playwrights and actors great freedom of artistic expression and broadens the scope of drama to express life. On a limited stage, actors use superb acting skills to bring the audience into various life associations such as dangerous peaks of rivers, military camps and villages, boating and riding in sedan chairs, climbing buildings and exploring the sea, etc., and jointly complete the art in the imagination of the audience. The task of creation. This is probably the reason why Chinese opera can reproduce colorful scenes and various forms of life on a stage with nothing.
It should be noted that virtual techniques do make a rigid stage free to come and go, but this freedom is by no means without any restrictions, it still has restrictions. This is subject to the basic law that art must truly reflect life. Therefore, the virtuality of the stage must be combined with the reality of the performance. For example: in "Horse Riding" (i.e. a set of virtual movements of riding a horse), the "horse" is virtual, but the whip is real. The actors' movements of whipping and beating horses must be accurate and rigorous, and conform to the objective logic of life (such as the horse riding in "Lanqi Gege"). Highly develop the hypothetical nature of drama, and at the same time pursue the authenticity of simulated life forms to achieve the combination of virtuality and reality. In particular, outstanding actors can often combine the two seamlessly, smoothly and naturally in their performances, so that audiences with rich life experience can understand them at a glance.