Dalian Peking Opera

  Dalian, China
Wednesday, October 10, 2007

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Last week I attended a performance at the Dalian Peking Opera. It's all in Chinese, of course, but the language hardly matters.  There are apparently 2 story lines - War and love.  This performance had 2 war episodes and 1 about an unresolved domestic problem involving a father and daughter, I think, which qualified for the love story.

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The performances are outrageous.  The sets are very simple.  You can see in the photos.  By the way, everyone takes photos and videos during public performances.  Also talking, chewing on candy, going to the lobby for a smoke.  This seems to be acceptable whether it's a concert, speech or opera.  One especially chatty woman was told to be quiet after she talked nonstop for the first 30 minutes of this performance.  She stopped for about 5 minutes, then went on again.  Anyway, camera phones and videos going from all seats.  Even OK to stand up in the aisle or in front of the stage to take your own front page picture.  So, of course, I joined in.
 

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The actors wear costumes and makeup to the max.  You could not get more silk on these guys.  The men who make up most of the actors, have some sort of truss arrangement on their backs so they can hang more silk over their heads as their own backdrop.  And the headgear can be a couple of feet tall, not counting the feathers that arc out 6 feet in some cases.  The feathers on the prince's headgear kept rubbing against the scenery and curtains.  He couldn't help it, the stage was not big enough for his hat.
 

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The performance itself is a stylized, very predictable story.  The characters are almost unmistakable as royalty, warriors, army, teachers, laborers.  Women were either wives or lovers.  The opera starts with a procession of all the characters that set the tome for the performance.  Then the main players have a say and the music starts.  The music is percussion with strings, and the overall sound effect falls between cars skidding to a stop just before impact and breaking glass.  That is until the women start to sing, then it gets weird.  More like a cat with a problem. And it's all paced by bamboo perscussion, which is easily the most pleasing sound of the assembly.
 

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The actors are very skilled doing things that no human would ever do in actual life settings.  They sing, they dance, they run, they whip around the big silk sails of fabric along with swords, spears and poles.  And they perform acrobatics - tumbling, kicks, handstands, jumps, handsprings and somersaults.  When they get really worked p, there might be one guy on stage singing and shouting and 3 or 4 others doing the random acrobatics.  Not that they are random, I mean they are all coordinated and don't run into each other, but they are all going different directions, including up and down.  The one lead guy did a series of split-jumps, landing on his crotch, maybe 6 times in a row while the audience went wild.  Thrilling.  I don't know if they collaborated with the Russians, but these guys are all over the squat-kick steps that the Russians think they have locked up. 
 
It's entirely entertaining, lasts about 2 hours.  

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The building that Dalian Opera is in was built during the Japanese occupation, 1932 according to one source, as a Shinto temple.  Beautiful classical Asian building.  The interior is still recognizable as a temple.  The opera is so unpretentious that the temple setting is just a routine feature of the operation.    
 
There are several videos of Dalian Opera on Youtube, like this one:  
Dalian Opera on Youtube:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BTznhLlfke8
 
And a short article about Dalian's Opera at:  http://english.dl.gov.cn/info/157282_231894.htm
 
Peking Opera Performance of "Xi Fu Shan", "Nu Qi xie", "Xiao Shang He"
Featuring: Yang Cheng, Xiao Di, Li Geng, and Fu Peng. Admission: 30rmb/50rmb/80rmb
2pm, October 2. #1 Jilin West Ln, Kunming Street (West of Dalian Foreign Lang.Inst) TEL (86411)8230 5411
 
 
From the Beijing Opera Study Guide  (http://www.fineartscenter.com/)
 
Beijing Opera stories are taken from history, mythology and literature and are
divided into two main types: civil and military. Civil plays focus on singing and often tell
stories of romance or takes place. Martial plays contain battle scenes from China's long
history and feature famous generals, heroic outlaws or women warriors. These stories are
familiar to audiences. When Chinese people go to the theatre, they don't go to find out
how the story ends - they already know how it ends. Instead, they go to see and hear the
actor's performing and singing skills.
 
Each character type has its own quality of movement and speech and its own
costume elements that make it special. For this reason actors usually specialize in one or
two roles. They play the same character types their whole life. There are four main types:
sheng, dan, jing, and chou. Sheng are the male roles. Sheng are subdivided into lao sheng
(old man), xiao sheng (young man) and wu sheng (warrior man). Dan are the female
roles. They are subdivided into qing yi (pronounced: ching ee) (gentlewoman), hua dan
(vivacious girl), wu dan (pronounced: oo dan) (women with martial skills), dao ma dan
(pronounced: dow ma dan) (sword and horse woman skilled in fighting with weapons)
and lao dan (rhymes with dow) (old woman).  Jing are the painted-face roles characterized by their elaborate and colorful makeup. Finally, chou (pronounced cho) are the clown characters, easily distinguished by their patch of white on the face.
 
In Beijing Opera the costumes and makeup are elaborate and colorful, but the
scenery and props are sparse. Chairs and tables can be used to represent a mountain, a
horse whip indicates the character is riding a horse, a paddle means the character is on a
boat and making a circle is the equivalent of a long journey. Audiences and actors are
meant to use their imaginations. Because there are a limited number of standard props
actors spend years practicing with the spears, swords and horse whips.

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