L7 课后复习 opera

I. Introduction1.Chinese opera, together with Greek tragedy and comedy and Indian Sanskrit are the three most ancient forms of drama in the world.2.It is a combination of literature, music, dance, martial arts, and acrobatics.3.Beijing Opera dates back to the 18th century.4.The costumes are always in bright colour.II. Beijing opera ,the best-known Chinese Opera, was developed during the Qing dynasty (1644-1911) .It is a national treasure and cultural symbol of China.It is a dramatic form that includes dance, theater, music, and skilled performance. Character types depend on vocal styles(唱腔). Performers wear dramatic makeup or masks.A. Opera Features:With their elaborate and colorful costumes, performers are the only focal points on Beijing opera's characteristically sparse stage.They utilize the skills of speech, song, dance, combat, and in movements that are symbolic and suggestive, rather than realistic.B. The StageThe Opera HouseCharacter vibrance.Stage kept plain.Traditional Beijing opera stages were built above the line of sight of the viewers.North, South, East & WestSome modern stages have been constructed with higher audience seating.Viewers are always seated south of the stage.All characters enter from the east and exit from the west.Whip is used to indicate a horse and an oar symbolizes a boatC. Women in Opera:The appearance of women on the stage began unofficially during the 1870s. Female performers began to impersonate male roles and declared equality with men.D. The 4 SkillsSinging, recitation, acting and acrobatic fighting/ Song，Speech，Dance-acting，CombatE. Characters:1. Sheng (生) Hang Dang (行當)The Sheng is basically a pure male role, especially in Peking opera, besides ching(淨) andchou(丑), the rest of the male personas would be all categorized into the Sheng Hang Dang.According to the age, characteristic, appearance and images, we can basically divide Sheng into the types of maturity, youth, and militant or martial art.The Sheng of mature, Laosheng .The Sheng of mature, Lao Sheng, often performed as an aging man or a middle-age man with beards.Zhuge Liang （诸葛亮），Wu Zixu （伍子胥），Huang Zhong （黄忠）The Sheng of youth, Xiaosheng .is usually a young scholar or a loveroften has the kind of handsome makeup without any beards.They would use a high-pitch voice to sing but a combination of high-pitch and low-pitch voice for speaking.Xu Xuan（许仙），Zhou Yu （周瑜，文武小生）The Sheng of martial art and militant, WushengWu Sheng is about the militant or martial males are skilled in the art of kung fu.They would use loud and masculine voice to sing and speak.Wu Song (武松），Zhao Yun（赵云）2. Tan Hang DangTan is about the pure female roles, like Sheng, for most of the time, Dan is also the main female role in the opera.According to their age, characteristic, and appearance, we would have the types of Lao Tan (老旦), Ching Yi (青衣), Hua Dan (花旦), Hua Shan (花衫), Wu Tan (武旦), Tao Ma Tan(刀馬旦), and Tsai Tan(彩旦), and only the Lao Tan would use low- pitch voice, and the rest of them would use a high-pitch voice for singing and speaking.Lao Tan (老旦)Lao Tan is a role of an aging woman, and performers would use the low-pitch voice for representing the aging body condition.She Taijun (佘太君),Ching Yi (青衣)Ching Yi is a role of the kind of faithful and moral women, especially a faithful wife, lover, or maiden in distress.Bai Suzhen (白素贞），Dou E (窦娥）Hua Tan (花旦)Hua Tan is a role of a very lively energetic young woman, or a young female flirt. Sometimes,a Hua Tan could be in a low social status, but with a comic character.Hua Shan (花衫)Hua Shan is a role that created by an opera master Mr. Mei Lanfang （梅蘭芳）.Hua Shan is a combination of Ching Yi and Hua Tan.Yu Ji （虞姬）Wu Tan (武旦)Wu Tan is a female martial or acrobatic fighter, and most of them are in a young age.Sun Erniang（孙二娘）Tao Ma Tan (刀馬旦)Tao Ma Tan is a female heroic warrior.They would wear the conventional costume of a female military officer; plus, a halberd or a long weapon in hands and sometime riding on a horse.Mu Guiying （穆桂英）Tsai Tan (彩旦)Tsai Tan is a comic female role.They could be hilarious, ridiculous, and bad looking at the same time.Tsai Tan is also in parallel with the clown role of Chou in the opera.Liu Meipo (刘媒婆）3. Ching Hang Dang (花臉)Ching(painted face) symbolizes anyone belonging to rough crowd and can be either good or evil.The acting style of ching will focus on loud voice and exaggerated movements.Ching can be subdivided into cheng ching, wu ching and fu ching.Cheng chingis a primarily painted-face role who emphasizes on singing and also named as “唱功花臉.”Cheng ching usually plays roles of higher social status, sophisticated manner or justice.Bao Zheng （包拯）Fu Ching 副淨(二花臉)Fu (assistant) ching, emphasizes acting and posturing on stage and called”架子花臉” as well.Fu ching often plays the role of brave and generous personality or masculine manner, like Zhang Fei.Dou Erdun （窦尔顿）架子花脸— Cao CaoWu Ching 武淨(武二花)Wu (martial-art) ching, a fighting and gymnastic role, who also called “摔打花臉”usually plays an assistant role to the main martial-arts player.Wu ching’s acting mainly focuses on fighting instead of singing or speaking.Dian Wei （典韦）4. Chou Hang Dang (小花臉)The clown roles, chou, include both male and female characters who play roles from different kinds of social status and also their language is colloquial and easily understood.The clown characters are easy to distinguish by a white "triangle" or “square” painted on the middle of the face.They are also free to make spontaneous remarks, to satirize other characters, or merely to bring out laughter.Wen Chou 文丑Wen chou who is funny and does not perform much martial-art.Wen chou could be subdivided into several types according to the status, age and characteristics.Wen chou mostly represents the common people and can be either good or evil.Subdivided types of Wen Chou「袍帶丑」refers to someone participates in official career.「方巾丑」refers to someone is knowledgeable, such as Jiang Gan （蒋干）.「茶衣丑」refers to the common people, such as fishermen.「老丑」refers to someone is elder.「丑婆子」refers to bad-looking female and also called “彩旦”.Wu Chou 武丑Wu chou,an acrobatic expert in martial arts, is cleaver and energetic; furthermore, can be either good or evil .Wu chou mostly belongs to “江湖人物” who could be the model of justice and help the weakness or the negative character in the gangsters.Wu chou will use lots of movements whey they are speaking for showing their characteristic as active and full of vitality; therefore, wu chou also named “開口跳”.F. Facial Makeup and CostumesThere are two ways to distinguish a character’s personality or role type.The first is to understand the color code of the painted face. The second is to distinguish the lines and patterns drawn on the face.The MakeupThe color codes of the painted faceRed defines loyal and upright personsPurple for loyal, brave, just, and noble charactersBlack face makeup for stern justice, and straightforward charactersGreen indicates stubborn, irritable (急躁), and not easily controlled charactersGold-silvered faces for ghosts and godsWhite for imperious (专横的) and treacherous (奸诈的) peopleYellow for fierce, brutal, and calculating charactersBlue for staunch, brave, scheming charactersA distorted face, drawn with asymmetrical (不对称的) lines, generally represents a villain (反派角色) or accomplice (同犯) or someone whose face has been wounded.The significance of the color on the painted-faceVarious personality traits are presented by different colors:Red stands for an honest, loyal, righteous, straightforward, and trustworthy character.White stands for cunning, slyness, and tricky.Black for bravery and justice.Classification of MakeupBeautified makeup (Handsome makeup)Characterized makeup (Facial pattern)Sentimental makeup (Changing face)Pictographic makeup (animal-shaped face)III. Other Major Traditional Chinese OperaA. Different Forms:Kunqu Opera✧Shaanxi Opera✧Chuan Opera✧Yue Opera✧Huangmei Opera✧Yue OperaKunqu Opera▪Kunqu Opera is known for its gentle and clear vocals, beautiful and refined tunes, and dance-like stage performance.▪In 2001, it was listed in the Oral and Intangible Cultural Heritage by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO联合国科教文组织). Shaanxi Opera▪Shaanxi Opera (秦腔), the oldest of all the Chinese operas that are still in existence today, is the typical opera of Shaanxi province.▪“A ncestors of all Chinese local operas”▪The Shaanxi Opera is of great fun and the elderly residents of Xi’an take particular delight in it even today.Chuan Opera▪In the mid-18th century, in Sichuan Province and some parts of Yunnan and Guizhou Provinces, Kunqu Opera and High-pitched Opera (高腔) were commonly performed together with the local operas; Influenced by each other, they blended into a new opera category designated as Chuan Opera.Face changes▪The technique of“face changes”is most often used in Chuan Opera.▪In some cases multiple layers of masks are torn away for each change in facial expression.Other stuns like “open a third eye, jumping through burning hoops and the swallowing of swords, spit fire吐火”Yue Opera▪It is popular throughout Zhejiang Province and Shanghai as well as in many large and medium-sized cities throughout the country.▪The soft and gentle music of this opera evokes sentimental emotions, and the acting style is likewise graceful and refined.Huangmei Opera▪Huangmei Opera has been performed for over 200 years. It is a local opera in Anhui Province and evolved from the “Caicha Tune”(tea-picking tune) of Huangmei County, Hubei Province.▪Huangmei Opera is easy to understand and learn because it employs simple words and literary traditions.Yue Opera▪Yue Opera is one type of traditional local operas, popular in Guangdong and Guangxi provinces and in Chinese communities in South Asia and America.B. Representative pieces:Yue Opera: Butterfly’s Love / Dream of the Red Mansions / The West Chamber / Chasing theFishKunqu Opera: Peony PavilionHuangmei Opera: The Heavenly Maid and the Mortal / Female Son-in-Law of the Emperor Beijing Opera:Chinese operas in western eyes▪Chinese opera has little in common with Western opera, and the screeching falsetto (假声) of the singers, the loud clacking of the clappers and the noisy banging of drums and cymbals (大镲）can sound strange to Western ears. But it is the costumes, variety of facial expressions, the actors' eye expressions and martial arts movements that mostly attract Western audiences.IV. Traditional Musical InstrumentsA. ClassificationTraditional musical instruments can be divided into three main categories:Plucked InstrumentsPercussion InstrumentsWind Instruments1. Plucked InstrumentsZither (Gu-zheng):Traditional Chinese musical instrument with 21 strings. There are Guzhengs with even more strings.Guqin: The very first Chinese musical instrumentLiterally, Gu Qin means "Ancient Musical Instrument". It is a seven string plucked Chinese musical instrument of zither family. Its sound is very peaceful, like resounding in a valley ▪created by Fu Xi at least 5000 years ago▪He chose the trunk of Wu-tong Tree (Phoenix Tree or Chinese Parasol) to make the musical instrument.▪The length of the musical instrument was 3 feet 6 inches and 1 Fen in order to match the number of degrees in a circle. The width was 8 inches at one end and 4 inches at the other end in order to match the number of terms and seasons in a year. He put five strings on it to match the Five Elements of Metal, Wood, Water, Fire and Soil. In Zhou Dynasty, the number of strings was increased to seven.Er-hu:Two-string bowed Chinese musical instrument, known in the West as the "Chinese violin"or "Chinese two-string fiddle".Pipa:A plucked Chinese musical instrument with four strings. Sometimes called the Chinese lute.It has a pear-shaped wooden body.Jinghu:a Chinese bowed string instrument in the huqin family, used primarily in Beijing opera. Itis the smallest smallest and highest pitched instrument in the huqin family.jinghu has 2 strings which were formerly made of silk, but in modern times are increasingly made of steel or nylon.2. Percussion InstrumentsDrum (Gu)Gong (Luo)Gongs and drums are general terms describing all sorts of percussion instruments3. Wind InstrumentsCeremonial horn (Suona)Bamboo Flute (Dizi):Is a Chinese traverse flute. Normally made of bamboo. There is also Dizi made of jade.Xiao:Pronounced as "Shyiao", a Chinese vertical end-blown flute. Normally made of bamboo. Its sound is thick, serious and peaceful.B. Popular Musical PiecesGuqin& Zither High Mount Flowing WaterPipa Ambush on All Sides / Spring Moonlight on the Flowers by the River Erhu Two Springs Reflect the MoonBamboo flute Three Variation of Plum Blossoms/ Journey in Suzhou / Happy Reunion Ceremonial horn One Hundred Birds Serenade the PhoenixExercises:What do you know about Beijing Opera? Work in pairs and choose the right answers.1. When did Beijing Opera start?a) the late 18th centuryb) the late 19th centuryc) the late 20th century2. How many main roles are there in Beijing Opera?a) 4 b) 8 c) 123. What are the main instruments played in Beijing Opera?a) violin b) jinghu c) drumd) piano e) sanxian f) guitar4. Which opera is worthy of the name “ancestor of all Chinese local operas”?A)Shaanxi Opera B) Yue OperaC) Huangmei Opera D) Kunqu Opera5. Which opera was listed in the Oral and Intangible Cultural Heritage by the UN.A)Shaanxi Opera B) Yue OperaC) Huangmei Opera D) Kunqu Opera6. Which opera is a local opera in Anhui Province?A)Shaanxi Opera B) Yue OperaC) Huangmei Opera D) Kunqu OperaMatch the main roles with their names.sheng male roles with brightlypainted face dan female roles jing clown roles chou male roles。