After the founding of the People's Republic of China, the government appropriated a special fund for the development of Peking Opera. Much progress was made in Peking Opera's performance, personnel training, play writing, music composition, education, research, legacy preservation, publishing and external exchanges. Performers entered state-owned or collective opera companies and became
employees of the state. Nationwide, the number of Peking Opera troupes above the county level reached 100, and opera schools across the country trained Peking Opera professionals.
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| The Nanjing Peking Opera Troupe holds an open house for children. | In the 1949-1964 period, a succession of outstanding performers brightened the Peking Opera stage. The four great dan role performers put on new plays. Their successors who came to maturity in the 1930s and 1940s became the mainstay of the stage. At the same time, a new crop of performers trained by New China were beginning to claim their place of prominence and took part in the creation of modem Peking Operas. These performers include Li Shaochun, Du Jinfang, Yuan Shihal, Gao Yuqian, Zhao Yanxia, Liu Changyu, Zhou Hetong, Tan Yuanshou, Ma Changli, Zhang Xuejin, Li Chongshan, Guan Sushuang, Li Rongwei, Fang Rongxiang, Song Yuqing and Tong Zhiling. In the meantime, external exchanges increased. The China Peking Opera Troupe, and opera troupes in Beijing, Shanghai and other cities kept putting up performances in foreign countries, winning acclaim wherever they went.
With the development of technologies, people can now watch Peking Opera performances not only in theaters but also in the cinema and on the TV screen. They can also hear Peking Opera singing over the radio and by playing the audio tape and CD. On holidays, Peking Opera performers offer programs
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| An advertisement for a real estate trade fair carried by Shenzhen Special Economic Zone Daily of April 12, 2001. | at evening parties that are broadcast live by TV and radio stations. When it goes from the stage to the screen, Peking Opera has shed some of its performing conventions. At the same time, people's interest has changed. They prefer performances that are entertaining, popular, pluralistic and in vogue. This has doubtlessly exerted a big impact on Peking Opera as a traditional stage art.
In the last 20-30 years, the Peking Opera market has shrunk, making it difficult for some performing troupes to survive. Some performers have been forced to take roles in films and TV plays, or become pop singers, TV hostesses or even fashion models. Some members of Peking Opera orchestras have joined pop music groups. In its competition with popular commercial culture. Peking Opera is fighting a losing battle. The number of people who love to watch Peking
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| A dan role in Drunken Beauty performed by a contemporary performer. | Opera has been declining. Younger generations have a strong sense of estrangement for traditional Peking Operas that reflect ancient life. "'I don't understand Peking Opera and I don't like to watch it" is a common attitude among young people.
Peking Opera is part of a traditional culture. It is unavoidable for people of the present age to feel estranged from it. The Chinese government has paid great attention to the promotion, protection and inheritance of traditional culture. Leaders of the country have often attended Peking Opera parties. Peking Opera has been playing an important role in international cultural exchanges, with numerous troupes staging performances abroad. Great attention has been paid to opera education. Television stations have held national Peking Opera performing contests that are broadcast live. China Central Television Station has opened a channel (CCTV-11) that is dedicated exclusively to broadcasting Chinese traditional operas, including Peking Opera.
The station also offers lectures on the basics of Peking Opera and makes Peking Opera films and TV plays. For several consecutive years, the station has sponsored national performing contests by Peking Opera piaoyou, or amateur performers. In recent years, the China Peking Opera Festival has been held three times, and the occasions were great holidays for fans and Peking Opera circles. The government has also spent a huge amount of money creating images for prerecorded Peking Opera singing by a great number of masters, most of whom have passed away. People involved worked eight years to
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| wAn American student plays the lead role in Drunken Beauty, a traditional Peking Opera, at an evening party in Nanjing university. | complete the rescue project. Many famous actors and actress of the present age in providing ima ges for past masters, have had the opportunity to train and show themselves. Thanks to the successful execution of the project, more than 300 plays now have images as well as the sound of singing. Resulting works of the project can not only serve as valuable teaching materials for Peking Opera students but also meet the need of fans and audiences to enjoy masterpieces. Works of the project provide young audiences of today with a convenient medium to know today's crop of outstanding performers and hear the channing singing of past masters.
In 1982, amid active exchanges between Chinese and Western cultures, Qi Xiaoyun (1930-2003), an actress good at playing the painted face role, sang arias in English in a Peking Opera "Othello." She also used English to sing songs in traditional operas Judge Bao and his Sister-in-law and Case of the Ungrateful Husband's Execution and translated and adapted the Baccae, a Greek tragedy by Euripides, into a Peking Opera.
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| Atlanta uses Peking Opera to promote the Olympics it hosts in 1996. | In May of 2002, at the centennial of Nanjing University, a group of foreigners clad in ancient Chinese theatrical costume performed in English the traditional Peking Opera Judge Bao and the Case of Qin Xianglian. They won repeated applause from the audience with their singing+ recitation, acting and fighting that have a genuine Peking Opera flavor. Professor Elizabeth Wichmann-Walczak. Chairwoman of Theater and Dance Department of University of Hawaii, translated the play and served as director.
All actors and actresses staging the show are students of the university majoring in music and the theater. In 1979, Elizabeth Wichmann-Walczak enrolled in Nanjing University as a student of the Chinese language and Chinese theater. She learned Peking Opera from Shen Xiaomei, a Peking Opera performer of the Mei Lanfang School. After returnin~ to the United States, she was determined to put up Peking Opera in English. After halfa year's hard work, English-language Peking Opera Judge Bao and the Case of Qin Xianglian was staged in February, 2002 for the public in Hawaii. A total of ten performance were staged, all to a full house.
Against today's open and plural cultural background, Peking Opera as a traditional art of the Chinese nation is understood and liked by an increasing number of foreigners. This is closely connected with the participation of Mei Lanfang, Cheng Yanqiu and other artists of the old generation in Chinese-foreign cultural exchanges and comparative studies of Chinese and Western theaters when Peking Opera was in its heyday. In the last century, footsteps of Peking Opera troupes have covered 40 countries and regions in the world. They have made important contributions to publicizing traditional Chinese culture promoting international cultural exchanges and enhancing understanding and friendship between the Chinese people and peoples of the rest of the world. |
