•Introduction

•About Chinese Opera

•Traditions

•Characters

•Performance

•Musical Accompaniment

•Gestures & Props

•Glossary

Because Chinese Opera traditionally uses historical stories and traditional tunes well known to the audience, viewers are able to focus their attention on the performers. The stories and songs are sung to a musical accompaniment, including gongs, cymbals and wooden clappers.

Gong

Cymbals

Wooden Clappers

The three main instruments used in Chinese Opera are: Qin Hu (fiddle), Ban Gu (small drum) and Yue Qin (moon guitar).

Qin Hu (fiddle)

Ban Gu (small drum)

Yue Qin (moon guitar)

There are more than 300 different regional styles of opera in China. All have much in common, including standardized role types, stories, costumes and makeup. The main distinctions lie in the music and dialect of the region.

The Beijing (Peking) Opera became the most famous operatic style, because it was so closely connected with the capital and patronized by the court. It gained prominence late in the 18th century, but has a continued history of over 900 years.

Beijing Opera is performed with no scenery and only a few props; instead, it relies heavily on gesture and mime. For example, actors will mime walking up and down stairs (opera goers enjoy counting and comparing the number of ascending and descending steps!), going on a journey by walking in a circle on the stage, or opening and closing a door by using hand gestures. A whip represents a horse, and a paddle represents a boat.

The film Farewell My Concubine demonstrates clearly the rigorous training program undertaken by the actors, training that lasts ten years or more. Nowadays, opera can sometimes be seen at spring festivals and various other special events. Traditional operas are often broadcast on Chinese radio stations and TV.

In the West, Beijing Opera has come to represent the Chinese approach to theater. Jo Ann Levy's historical novel, Daughter of Joy, describes a Chinese Opera performance at the American Theater in San Francisco during the California Gold Rush era. As the stage curtain opened, Levy tells us, cymbals crashed and "a magnificently dressed actor sat on a chair on top of a table. His gown of red and blue satin shimmered with gold embroidery. Its dozens of tiny mirrors flashed reflections from the theater's lights." The audience was expected to understand that the man on the table was an important commander watching from a mountain top, and that a man carrying an oar and an umbrella was rowing a boat across a river in a rainstorm.