Wu Yancheng

01 · Lineage & Regional School

In 1963 she joined the Shaoguan Prefecture Caicha Opera training class, where she learned the basic skills of the genre; she then formally entered the Shaoguan Prefecture Experimental Caicha Opera Troupe, studying Caicha Opera under He Peizhu, the troupe's leading huadan. Within the regional tradition and school record of Caicha Opera in Shaoguan, Guangdong: Yuebei caicha opera circulates in the Hakka areas around Shaoguan in northern Guangdong and across the Hakka mountain areas of eastern Guangdong, southern Jiangxi, southern Hunan and eastern Guangxi; the various lines formed on the basis of lantern and huagu song-and-dance, with the Shaoguan Yuebei Caicha Opera Conservation and Transmission Centre as the professional transmission body. It derives from the “tea-picking mountain songs and ditties” popular in Fujian and Jiangxi before the Ming and Qing. After 1949 Yuebei caicha opera developed fairly quickly, with professional caicha opera troupes founded in a number of counties and cities and a number of fine traditional plays collated and restored. Drawing on local opera annals, Yuebei caicha opera derives from the tea-picking mountain songs and ditties of Fujian and Jiangxi before the Ming and Qing, and after 1949 professional troupes were founded in Shaoguan and its counties, collating and restoring a group of traditional plays.

02 · Mastery & Signature Works

Female, of Han ethnicity, born in September 1949 in Shaoguan, Guangdong Province. She absorbed and drew on the performance forms of other xiqu genres, integrating them with the traditional characteristics of Caicha Opera to form a distinctive style of her own. She is accomplished in huadan and qingyi performance and in the choreography of Caicha dance, and has a thorough command of the conventions of Caicha Opera performance; besides a deep understanding of her characters' inner feelings, she applies with assurance the genre's signature blend of song and dance, creating roles such as Liu Qiaozhen in The Road of Life (Ren Sheng Lu) and Zhou Xiulian in Green Hills, Eastward-Flowing Water (Qing Shan Shui Dong Liu); she has taken part in provincial festivals on many occasions and won awards. Within the documented technical tradition of Caicha Opera in Shaoguan, Guangdong: Yuebei caicha opera (sanjiao opera) is a local folk short-play genre circulating in northern Guangdong. In the course of transmission it steadily absorbed the lantern and huagu song-and-dance forms of southern Jiangxi and southern Hunan, gradually becoming a distinctive local genre of northern Guangdong. It is found across the vast Hakka areas of eastern Guangdong, southern Jiangxi, southern Hunan and eastern Guangxi. It has a large number of traditional plays, such as Mo Doufu and Shuang Shuang Pei celebrating freedom of marriage, Mai Zahuo and Da Gou Quan Fu upholding good and punishing evil and promoting family ethics, and A San Kan Jie and Ye Dao Han Yi lashing and satirising social ugliness. Some traditional plays, through years of performance, have taken on new artistic life by absorbing and drawing on the strengths of other fine genres. A song-and-dance genre centred on the dan, chou and sheng roles, its singing builds on tea-picking tunes while absorbing the lantern and huagu song-and-dance of southern Jiangxi and southern Hunan, its language the Hakka dialect and its performance lively and humorous. Representative repertoire, works and technical entries recorded for the project include: "Mo Doufu (Grinding Tofu)": A traditional play celebrating freedom of marriage. "Shuang Shuang Pei (A Double Match)": A traditional play celebrating freedom of marriage. "Mai Zahuo (Selling Sundries)": A traditional play upholding good and punishing evil. "Da Gou Quan Fu (Beating the Dog to Admonish the Husband)": A traditional play on family ethics.

03 · Transmission & Safeguarding Status

She was a national representative bearer of Caicha Opera (North Guangdong Caicha Opera), a fourth-batch national intangible cultural heritage project.

04 · Associated Heritage Item Dossier

05 · Fellow National Bearers Lineage

National representative bearers recorded under the same item code, ordered from the first to the sixth batch. Batch order is not a teacher–student relationship.

06 · Archival Sources & Bibliography

1. Wu Yancheng · National Representative Bearer Archive