"Tinder" is a well-made large-scale original modern Cantonese opera created by Dongguan Daojiao Town. Photo by Liu Yinglin
The thickness of history, the lightness of art, the traditional singing voice, the modern narrative... If you are interested in the development and innovation of Cantonese opera culture, then you should not miss the large-scale original modern Cantonese opera "Tinder" created by Dongguan Daojiao. This large-scale modern Cantonese opera, which is generally highly praised by industry insiders and is even expected to become a "new classic", has an innovative creative method and a modern performance form, and the first performance was a great success. The performance of "Tinder" has also become an important part of the Daojiao "Cantonese Opera Music Art Golden Week" launched on October 13.
Co-creation in innovative forms
In the premiere of the large-scale original modern Cantonese opera "Tinder", when the narrator told the prototype of the protagonist in the play, the martyr Ye Duohui, who died for the revolution in the winter of 1928, many on-site audience members could not help but shed tears.
A "Tinder" shows the arduous revolutionary history of the revolutionary martyrs.
To celebrate the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China, Tinder began to brew as early as November 2019, and it took a year from the formal formation of a creative team to collect materials, organize materials, write scripts and rehearsals.
This drama was created by Daojiao inviting the professional team of our province to participate in depth and work together.
Liang Yunan, the screenwriter and director of "Tinder", introduced that the prototype of the protagonist in the play is Ye Duohui, a revolutionary martyr born in Daojiao. This time, it joined hands with Daojiao Town to create this Cantonese opera and adopted an innovative cooperation model. After entering Daojiao, the main creative team not only made every effort to create a good drama, but also focused on helping Daojiao's local Cantonese opera talents to continuously improve the level of Cantonese opera.
The plot line of "Tinder" mainly focuses on the most difficult period of the revolution before the Guangzhou Uprising.
It is worth mentioning that "Tinder" is different from the perspective of many Cantonese opera works, this drama does not depict too many big people, but concentrates almost all the pen and ink to describe the growth and butterfly changes of ordinary people. The male protagonist Ye Duohui used his revolutionary spirit to ignite the "fire" in the hearts of his father and wife, so that the people around him changed from opposing the revolution to actively supporting the revolution and devoting themselves to the revolution. The whole drama shows the mark of the big era through the fate of the small people.
In order to be closer to the historical facts, Liang Yunan and the creative team went to Dongguan many times to collect wind, search for the real historical materials of Ye Duohui, and on this basis, they created the script of "Tinder".
In terms of artistic achievements, "Tinder" not only has a rich singing voice, but also combines the atmospheric and aesthetic stage structure, and even introduces symphonic elements to meet the appreciation needs of audiences with different preferences in different dimensions.
"Tinder" will become an "evergreen drama"
According to reports, in addition to Liang Yunan, who once won the "Five One Project Award" of the Central Propaganda Department and the "Wenhua Award" of the former Ministry of Culture, the main creative team of "Tinder" also consisted of Liang Shuqing, a national first-class actor and winner of the 18th Chinese Drama Plum Blossom Award, and Pan Shaoxing, a famous Cantonese opera actor and director, as deputy directors. Feng Gangyi, winner of the Chinese Drama Plum Blossom Award for the second time, joined the performance.
The main cast members are mostly Cantonese opera talents from Daojiao Town and members of Daojiao's local music and art clubs.
"It is very rare that there is a group of professional Cantonese opera teams in Daojiao Town." Liang Yunan commented that in Daojiao, he saw the "tinder" of Cantonese opera.
Liang Yunan found that Daojiao attaches great importance to Cantonese opera culture and has a wealth of talents. Therefore, most of the main actors of "Tinder" are professionals of Daojiao Town Cultural Service Center, and they are also graduates of Guangdong Cantonese Opera School, with a very solid foundation. Most of the actors in the play are members of the Daojiao Qu Art Society.
The actors are all from Daojiao, which brings a valuable advantage, that is, after the performance, this Cantonese opera will not become difficult to copy because the actors are scattered. Because the actors are living in Daojiao, Daojiao can restart the rehearsal and performance of this drama at any time in the future, so that this high-quality Cantonese opera work can remain active and become an "evergreen work" that can be performed continuously for a long time.
Cantonese opera based on local products has won many awards
Daojiao Town is the famous "Hometown of Chinese Opera Art", and "Cantonese Opera Golden Week" is a Cantonese opera opera activity brand carefully built by Daojiao Town for many years, which has been held for 18 consecutive years since 2003.
In recent years, Daojiao Town has adhered to the local theme as a sample, actively created a high-quality repertoire of "applause and applause", and promoted dongguan Cantonese opera to shine in innovation and development.
At the end of last year, the "Poverty Alleviation Storm" drama produced by the Cultural Service Center of Daojiao Town, Dongguan City, won the first prize of the "Precision Poverty Alleviation Ben Xiaokang" small drama sketch in Guangdong Province. Over the years, a number of Cantonese opera works such as "Caiju Huisheng", "Warm Old Man's Heart", "Life and Death Sign", "Miao Shan Qing", "Wooden Fish New Singing Happiness Song" and so on from Daojiao's hand have also won provincial and municipal and national awards respectively.
The birth of excellent works is inseparable from the deep mass foundation. At present, Daojiao Town has 21 registered amateur opera clubs, 2 provincial and municipal Cantonese opera (quyi) creation bases, 1 drama and music association, 1 youth Cantonese opera quyi training center, and more than 600 Cantonese opera music lovers participate in performance activities all year round.
Liang Yunan said that he hopes that "Tinder" can become a long-term work. Although the story takes place in Daojiao, I hope that "Tinder" can go to the whole province and the whole country, and let more people pay attention to Cantonese opera, and more people, especially young people, can like Cantonese opera.
According to this idea, Cantonese opera "Tinder" is also expected to become a "spark of stars" to promote Cantonese opera to further "go out of the circle" and enter more people's lives.
Author: Lu Zhenwei