Ma Yulou

03-0987Jinju (Shanxi Opera)Traditional OperaShanxiBatch 3 (2009)

Mastery, Signature Works & Repertoire

Female, Han ethnicity, born in June 1934 in Fenyang County, Shanxi Province. At the age of twelve she joined the Gufeng Troupe of Fenyang County to study under Sun Fu'e, a celebrated performer of Jinju, and was later transferred to the Xinxin Troupe in Taiyuan, where she formally became a disciple of Ding Guoxian and specialised in the xusheng (bearded male) role type. She inherited the tonal charm and the method of vocal delivery of the Ding school, and her singing is distinguished by its sustained, steady quality. Combining the Fenyang dialect with that of Hebei, she shaped a declamatory style for Jinju that is grand and vigorous with exceptionally clear enunciation. She is also adept at using the beard, the hat wings and the stage footwork of high-soled boots to portray a character's inner conflicts, thereby enriching the expressive forms of the stage. Her representative works include Zhuo Fang Cao (Cao Cao's Escape and Release), Sha Xi (Killing Xi), Silang Visits His Mother, Ba Jian Yi (Eight Pieces of Clothing), Si Jin Shi (The Four Successful Candidates) and the modern opera The Red Lantern. From the late 1980s to the present she has taken numerous disciples, most of whom have since become celebrated performers; in 2005 she was invited to run a training programme, continuing to contribute to the transmission and development of the Ding school of Jinju.

Honors & Recognition

National representative bearer of Jinju (Shanxi Opera), a third-batch national intangible cultural heritage project.

References & Archival Sources

Ma Yulou · National Representative Bearer Archive

Representative Items of This Bearer

Profile

Representative item: Jinju (Shanxi Opera)
Item code: Ⅳ-18
Category: Traditional Opera
Region: Shanxi
Born: 1934.06
Batch: Batch 3 (2009)

This static English edition is rendered at the edge for search engines, AI crawlers and readers without JavaScript. Compiled from official national representative bearer archival records, organized by topic and translated into English. 阅读中文版。