Chao opera ushered in a new spring

The first full-time undergraduate class of Chao Opera of the China Academy of Drama appeared on the Spring Festival Gala of CCTV Opera in the New Year. Courtesy of respondents

"My achievements and honors in Chao opera belong to the genre of drama. Whether it is my biography or my artistic research, in the final analysis, it belongs to Chao opera. Chao opera ushered in a new spring. Recently, Yao Xuanqiu, honorary president of Guangdong Chao Theater and a famous Chao opera performance artist, said at the launch ceremony of the "Chao Opera Series New Book" held at the Guangdong Chao Theater.

The Chao opera series of monographs was first published in a concentrated manner, which was the first time in the Guangdong Chao Theater. It is understood that the "new books in the Chao opera series" include the biography "Chaoyin Man Dance Jinghua - Yao Xuanqiu Biography", the Chao opera research treatise "Yihai Guanchao - Starting from the Performance Artist Yao Xuanqiu", and the Chao opera dance research monograph "Chao Opera Drama Origin, Stage Beauty Life - Guan Shanyu Stage Art Design Works Anthology", these works record the development process of Chao opera, so that Chao opera shines with new brilliance in the new era.

In Guangdong, Chao opera, as the essence of traditional culture, travels through time and is deeply imprinted in the hearts of the people. For the Chaoshan people, the melodious melody of Chaoshan opera has long been integrated into their blood. At a time when Shantou is accelerating the construction of a regional cultural highland, Chao opera art has attracted more and more young fans, which not only makes the city's cultural atmosphere more and more intense, but also helps Chao opera art to innovate in inheritance.

● Nanfang Daily reporter Zhang Weiwei

Fine creation keeps pace with the times

Known as the "Flowers of the Southern Country", Chao opera has a history of more than 580 years and is an important spiritual link connecting hipsters at home and abroad. In October 2020, when General Secretary Xi Jinping inspected Guangdong, he praised Chaoju opera and other Chinese cultural treasures, and stressed that "Chaozhou culture has distinct regional characteristics, is an important part of Lingnan culture, and is an important branch of Chinese culture".

How to revitalize the ancient Chao opera is an important topic that Shantou has actively explored in recent years. At the beginning of 2021, the "eight batches" project plan issued by the Shantou Municipal Party Committee and the Shantou Municipal Government clearly proposed that it is necessary to arrange a number of plays, establish a number of cultural brands that benefit the people, strive to create a new situation in the protection and utilization of historical and cultural heritage in Shantou, and accelerate the construction of a regional cultural highland based on eastern Guangdong and facing the whole country.

Under the impetus of the policy, many Chao opera workers continue to innovate and create, and a number of new plays carefully created and arranged have been staged one after another and received praise. Focusing on the "Eight Batches" project plan, Guangdong Chao Theater continues to run a series of brand activities such as "Chao Opera Grand View Garden, Friday Drama" and "Theater Impression", enriches the cultural life of citizens through songs, dances, skits, Chao music performances and other literary and artistic forms, actively promotes the creation and performance of plays such as "Secret Traffic Station", "Embroidered Tiger", "Hero Long Song", "Wanghai Tide" and other plays, and actively promotes the participation of outstanding plays in national exhibitions. In addition, the ancient Chao opera also combines new communication methods to attract more and more audiences through online performing arts forms such as cloud theater and network live broadcast room...

Zhang Yihuang, vice president of Guangdong Chao Theater, said that the pace of Guangdong Chao Theater in the innovation of Chao opera has never stopped. He pointed out that in recent years, the fine stage of Chao opera has emerged one after another, advancing with the times, and has radiated strong vitality. Among them, the newly compiled modern dramas of Chao opera "Ammu of the Red Army", "Son of the People", "Wanghai Tide", "Xu Baoye" and other plays have frequently won national and provincial awards, showing a trend of "writing modern, acting modern, and singing modern".

The New Forces take over the baton

The inheritance and development of any art is inseparable from the "passing on and helping" of the older generation of artists, and the same is true for Chao opera. In the protection, innovation and development of Chao opera, Yao Xuanqiu, honorary director of Guangdong Chao Theater and famous Performance Artist of Chao Opera, is a key figure.

Yao Xuanqiu is an outstanding representative of the new generation of Chao opera actors who grew up under the cultivation of the Party after the founding of New China, and witnessed the vigorous development of Chao Opera art under the leadership of the Party. From 70 years of art, this outstanding actor has created a vivid artistic image, making Chao opera burst out with unprecedented artistic vitality. At the same time, as a 65-year-old Communist Party member, Yao Xuanqiu used the tide tone to unite the hearts of overseas Chinese, consciously assumed the mission of disseminating traditional Chinese culture, and always selflessly supported the younger generation.

In 2000, although Yao Xuanqiu retired from the troupe, she "retired without rest" and continued to participate in public welfare performances and guide students. In 2008, Yao Xuanqiu was rated as the representative inheritor of the national intangible cultural heritage Chao opera project. In order to give play to the role of veteran artists in "passing on the help", Yao Xuanqiu, who settled in Guangzhou, travels to Shantou no less than 10 times a year, and does her best to promote the inheritance and development of the cause of Chao opera art. In 2015, Yao Xuanqiu Art Transmission Institute was established and was selected into the Ministry of Culture's "Famous Artists Passing on The Opera - Contemporary Opera Masters Receiving Apprentices and Passing on The Art" project.

Over the years, groups of students under the guidance of Yao Xuanqiu have grown into mainstays in the field of Chao opera performance. In the process of "passing on help and guidance," Yao Xuanqiu did not forget to teach the students to be grateful to the party, listen to the party, follow the party, and be socialist literary and art workers with both moral integrity and art.

"I often hear Teacher Yao's students evaluate her as a teacher and a mother. She has both the majesty of a teacher and the intimacy of a mother, caring for her students. Teacher Yao does not put up any big shelves, and we usually call her Aunt Qiu. Wu Ling'er, the first disciple under Yao Xuanqiu's door, commented.

Today, Yao Xuanqiu, who is nearly ninety years old, still contributes to the development of Chao opera to the best of his ability. She said that the tide people are all over the world, and the tide opera is an important communication link. Keeping the right and innovating go hand in hand is the next development direction of Chao opera, and in the future, Chao Opera will continue to "go out" and go to the whole country and go abroad.

"Despite her retirement for many years, Ms. Yao Xuanqiu usually participates in the teaching of Chao opera art, often attends some activities in the theater industry, and spares no effort in the promotion and inheritance of Chao Opera art." The descendants of Chao opera said that young people should take over the "baton" of the older generation of artists, pass on the classic repertoire from generation to generation, and let the excellent traditional culture of Chao opera be carried forward.

His writings enrich the theory of Teochew opera

Recently, the Success of the Chao Opera circle has been frequently reported: the China Academy of Opera has opened the first full-time undergraduate class of Chao Opera, increased the intensity of talent training, and the trainees have boarded the New Year CCTV Opera Spring Festival Gala; the Standing Committee of the Guangdong Provincial People's Congress has also reviewed and approved the regulations on the protection and inheritance of Chao Opera in Shantou, Chaozhou and Jieyang, creating a precedent for coordinated legislation in the cultural field throughout the country, so that the development of Chao Opera has a law to follow; Yao Xuanqiu won the 2021 "Southern Cantonese Innovation Award", and the Chao Opera series monographs were first published in a concentrated manner...

At the launch ceremony of the Chao opera series monographs, Yao Xuanqiu passionately said that "Chao opera has ushered in a new spring".

According to reports, "Chaoyin Man Dance Jinghua - Yao Xuanqiu Biography" was written by Chaoyin Man And Huang Jianfeng, a Chao writer, mainly describing Yao Xuanqiu's artistic career and artistic achievements; "Watching the Tide in the Sea - Starting from Yao Xuan's Autumn Chao Opera Art" was written by Shen Xiangqu, a famous playwright and theoretical research expert at Guangdong Chao Theater, which has positive significance for the research and enrichment of Chao Opera art theory; "Chao Drama Edge, Stage Beauty Life - Guan Shanyu Stage Art Design Works Anthology" The selection of more than 20 representative stage works of Guan Shanyu, stage art designer of Guangdong Chao Theatre, is a retrospective summary of Guan Shanyu's many years of stage design work.

"The book 'The Biography of Yao Xuan's Autumn' comprehensively and in detail records The Artistic Journey of Teacher Yao, which describes many highlight moments in the history of Chao opera." Huang Jianfeng introduced that Yao Xuanqiu's artistic experience is tortuous and moving, spanning more than 70 years, and the performance footprints have spread all over the world, and the content recorded in the book is still limited. Next, he will continue to study and continue to communicate with Teacher Yao, so as to make the content of the works richer and record more history for Chao opera.

"Opera pays attention to inheritance, inheriting the past, and we have the responsibility to tell the valuable experience of our predecessors to future generations." Shen Xiangqu introduced that he usually likes to explore the human feelings of drama while writing scripts, and he will combine the articles published in newspapers and periodicals over the years into a book, hoping to enrich the theory of Chao opera art.

According to the relevant person in charge of the Guangdong Chao Theater, the Guangdong Chao Theater will complete the "Six Ones" project of the series of publicity and promotion activities for Yao Xuanqiu's artistic achievements with the support of the Propaganda Department of the Shantou Municipal Party Committee and the Shantou Municipal Bureau of Culture, Tourism and Sports. The three first published Chao opera works involve drama history, sound cavity, music, directing and stage art, which not only enrich the theoretical research results of Chao opera, but also have guiding value for the artistic practice of Chao opera.