When I was singing in Hankou, my mother came to Shanghai from her hometown in Hebei. Mother and son did not see each other for several years, and when I heard that my mother was coming, I rushed back to Shanghai. Back in Shanghai, my eldest brother's illness was not yet better, and he was idle at home to urge me to practice and learn drama. Every day, I get up at three o'clock in the middle of the night and go to the Shandong Guild Hall to practice. At that time, the area was still very desolate, full of small rivers and graves. It was dark, it was snowing overnight, the snow on the ground was thick, and there was only a lake silk sister who went to work in the middle of the night on the road, and squeaked through in a wheelbarrow. There was no street lamp, and I couldn't see my five fingers, but I could see the oncoming people through the flickering snow light.
When I arrived at the Shandong Guild Hall, I kicked the snow with my feet, swept out a clearing, and took off my clothes and flipped up.
Along the way, the limbs were already frozen, and I didn't know the pain when I fell to the ground. Wait until dawn, the pedestrians gradually increased, this is the rest of the work home, when you get home, do not dare to enter the door, stay outside the door slowly for a while, and then dare to enter the house. Because the family was waiting for me to cook rice in the raw stove, it was frozen outside in the middle of the night, the ears and nose were frozen, and when it touched the heat, one cold and one hot, I would get sick if I was not careful.
In addition to practicing, the eldest brother also invited two old gentlemen to teach me drama, one is Mr. Yang Wenyu and the other is Mr. Xue Tongshou. Mr. Xue Lao is a singer of Lao Dan, who once sat in a class in the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom Army, and my plays such as "Oil Mountain", "Fishing for Golden Turtles", and "Broken Dragon Robe" were learned from him. Because he had lived in the army, he was proficient in practicing the fa, whether it was lining up troops and fighting against each other. These knowledges were of great help to me in the future in the play to design the opening of the two armies against each other and the changes in various formations. He went up again to the wall, a wall that was more than a foot high, and he stepped on the shoulder of the man and went up. I was fascinated by his skills, and I learned a lot with him. The eldest brother has been sick at home for a long time, the family's life has not depended on it, at this time I have learned more than a dozen plays with the two old gentlemen, can not stay at home, no way, had to go out with crickets to bite it, do not bite no millet to eat. Hangzhou and Suzhou are big places, and most of the horns from Beijing, except for Shanghai, have to sing in these two places. In order to earn money to support my family, I had to go to Hangzhou to work.
At that time, the market in Hangzhou was deserted, and the area around Gongchen Bridge outside the city was the British Concession and the Japanese Concession, and the commercial market was concentrated there. There are four theaters in Hangzhou: Tianxian, Ronghua, Yangchun and Fuxian, and I was the team of the Tianxian Theater that I originally built.
Originally, my stage name was "Golden Bean", which was started by Tianjin Longqing and Mr. Lao Qi of Keban. He looked at me with a strong spirit, quite aggressive, and played a martial arts, so he gave me this name. I was thirteen years old, and there I was standing there, like a thrush, very spiritual. However, it is not very appropriate to use this name for singing and opera, so when I arrived in Hangzhou, everyone gave me another stage name, and studied it to say that it was called "Xiao Ju Xian", which I did not like. At that time, Tan Xinpei called it "Little Called Heaven", and I said that I would call it "Little Called Heaven", I meant to use his name to get some millet to eat. Unexpectedly, one of the people here looked down on me and sneered at the side, saying, "Hmm, you deserve to be called this too!" "This moment put me on fire, I was young and angry, and he stood up on the spot. Why can't I use this name? Can you see people dead? Not only is it to inherit the art of my predecessors, but I also have to become a family of my own, "cover" the sky, and be unique. In this way, I used the three words "cover the sky" with great intent.
In Hangzhou, my first day's cannon play was "Tianshui Guan", and I played Kong Ming. The next day's play was "Cuiping Mountain", because I had the martial arts background of "Hao Tianguan" and "Zhao Jia Lou", so Shi Xiu's all the way to the liuhe knife in the play was very popular. The play on the third day is "The Broken Dragon Robe". The first day or two was the old monk's hat— flat and flat. On the third day, there was a good review after singing. On the fourth day, I played "Eighteen Pulls", in which the two brothers and sisters were in the mill, grinding powder on the one hand, singing various tunes for recreation, and I played the role of my sister, stepping on it, which was very likable. Thirteen-year-old Xiao Wusheng had never been before, and he didn't ask Lao Sheng, Lao Dan, Wu Sheng, and Hua Dan to sing, so after a few days of cannon play, he immediately became "red". The theater gave me seventy yuan a month's worth of silver, which was quite a lot at the time. My mother was at home waiting for me to earn money to buy rice and cookers, and my eldest brother waited for me to earn money to treat my illness.
After singing in Tianxian for more than eight months, Yangchun Opera Hall asked me to come over and added me ten yuan to pack silver. Sang in Yangchun for five months, returned to Tianxian to sing for three months, sang in Hangzhou for a year and a half, and then went to Suzhou. The first time I went to Suzhou to perform, I remember: "Cuiping Mountain", "Dingjun Mountain", "White Water Beach", "Search for Orphans and Save Orphans" and "Mulberry Garden Senders" these plays. It was also welcomed by the Audience in Suzhou.
At this time, Sing and learn, in addition to performing on stage, keep practicing twice a day, practice two plays, and shout in the morning. When I sang in Suzhou, one of my audience members was a dart master named Liu Si, who loved to watch my plays. He and I made friends, and in the morning we practiced the six-in-one knife and the three-section stick together.
At that time, the only people who could do the three-section stick were Zheng Faxiang's father Lao Saihuo, Zhang Delu's father Zhang Shunlai, as well as Gao Fu'an, Jiang Licheng and me. Now that they are all old and dead, there are fewer and fewer people who can play.
I sang back and forth twice in Hangzhou and Suzhou, and the second time I returned to Hangzhou from Suzhou, I was tired and sick, and I was sick with typhoid fever and high fever. There is a Zhang Daxian Temple in Hangzhou, and when I burned to the point of no one knowing, I was unconscious as if I had been invited to the temple to sing a play. The first play is "Vazidu", after singing no, and let sing a "White Water Beach", two plays after singing, people are tired, sweaty like water, gasping for breath I woke up, it turned out that I was still sleeping on the bed. My mother was superstitious and said that this was blessed by Zhang Daxian and asked me to be a righteous son in Zhang Daxian's name. In fact, the disease is tired of singing, people are still worried about the play in the disease, and the delirium will also play, but this sweat has alleviated the disease a lot. When the illness was better, the hair was all bald.
When my father died that year, it cost me some money to buy land for burial, and coupled with my illness, the family had to live on the pawn shop. After a few months of recuperation after illness, he did not fully recover, his legs were still weak, and in order to live, he drove the ducks to the shelves and had to go on stage again. One day, either the first day of the first year or the fifteenth day of the first year, everyone went to the Lingyin Temple to burn incense, and I followed suit.
That night my play was "Flower Butterfly", in the play to turn over three stages, I and the eldest brother did not wait for dark to come back early, passing by Jiulisong, tired of walking, the two sat in a hut to rest. At that time, I was wearing a coat of iron scarf and yarn, with raw silk hanging linings on my feet, a pair of cloud-headed thick-soled shoes on my feet, a large shiny braid on my head, and a jade belt carved hair fan in my hand, and the two heads were black and white, and there was how long the ruler was.
Sitting in the pavilion watching the pedestrians who came and went to burn incense, there were young men pushing carts, there were girls who picked up burdens, there were old ladies carrying incense bags on crutches, there were officials riding horses and sitting in green sedan cars... They all laughed gleefully and cheerfully. But I was worried in my heart: I thought of turning over these three tables at night, my legs were not strong, I couldn't fall to my death on the stage, I didn't want to jump in my heart, but I didn't turn over and there was no millet to eat... Sitting there, looking at the appearance is quite spiritual, but who knows the pain in the heart.
I was worried, and I looked up and saw a plaque hanging in the pavilion, on which were written three big words: "Learn to be old." I carefully pondered the meaning of these words on this plaque, and secretly made a wish in my heart: "If I don't fall to my death tonight, I can get off the stage too peacefully, and I will definitely practice and study every day in the future, day by day, until I am old." In the future, I always remembered this sentence, and specially asked Mr. Huang Binhong to write me a banner and hang it at home as a motto to supervise myself.
In the evening, I plucked up enough courage to flip down from the three tables, and fortunately did not fall. But it was enough, and when it landed, the upper and lower teeth slammed into the tongue with a strong touch. Fortunately, no one saw his face on the stage, and he swallowed the blood in pain, and then turned around and continued to sing as if nothing had happened.
Hangzhou sang for a period, I returned to Shanghai to join the team of Yuxian Tea Garden, when I was only fourteen years old. The Yuxian Tea Garden opened near the Mengyuan Hostel on the Fourth Road, and the class owner was the old Sanmazi, who himself also performed on stage, along with Zhao Ruquan and Xie Yueting. I remember that the drama of my first four days was: the first day "Cuiping Mountain", the second day "White Water Beach", "Search for Orphans and Rescue Orphans", the third day "Eighteen Pulls", the fourth day "XiHuangzhuang", "Wax Temple".
This was the first time I met the audience in Shanghai under the stage name of "Gai Ming Tian", and as in Hangzhou and Suzhou, I was welcomed by the audience after the performance, and the audience applauded from time to time.
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