Caicha Opera
01 · Historical Records
Fuzhou caicha opera developed on the basis of the Ming tea-lantern opera and by absorbing local folk tunes; according to the Linchuan County Gazetteer it has a history of more than four hundred years. Fuzhou caicha opera grew out of folk lantern song-and-dance and, influenced by the Ming Fuhe opera and Hubei Huangmei opera, has vivid and humorous language, fine and brisk music, plain movement and song-and-dance, with a strong local character. Drawing on the Linchuan County Gazetteer and local opera annals, Fuzhou caicha opera grew out of the Ming tea-lantern opera and folk lantern song-and-dance and, influenced by Fuhe opera and Hubei Huangmei opera, has been transmitted orally over more than four hundred years, with more than a hundred pieces sung.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
There are more than one hundred pieces in circulation, including single-stage plays (one-man plays), excerpt plays, full-length plays and serial plays. Fuzhou caicha opera's singing is based mainly on bendiao and Fudiao with many ditties and miscellany, its language vivid and humorous, its music fine and brisk, its movement plain and its mode song-and-dance; its pieces take the forms of single-stage plays, excerpt plays, full-length plays and serial plays.
Nangua Ji (The Pumpkin Tale)
One of the traditional full-length plays of Fuzhou caicha opera, belonging to its serial-play system.
Gujia Ji (The Gu Family Tale)
One of the traditional full-length plays of Fuzhou caicha opera, mostly on family ethics and worldly affairs.
Bu Beida (Mending the Vest)
One of the traditional short plays of Fuzhou caicha opera, expressing its song-and-dance and humorous performance character.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
Fuzhou caicha opera is popular around Linchuan in Fuzhou and is an important branch of Jiangxi caicha opera; Linchuan had a tradition of Fuhe opera and lantern art since the Ming, and caicha opera formed on the basis of local folk tunes under the influence of Huangmei opera, with the Linchuan District Fuzhou Caicha Opera Training Institute as the professional transmission body.
Other submitting regions for the same item: Caicha Opera · Caicha Opera · Caicha Opera · Caicha Opera · Caicha Opera · Caicha Opera.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
The single-stage plays preserve the primitive form of opera, the short plays mostly portraying lowly people and the full-length plays mostly telling romances and myths. Fuzhou caicha opera has been transmitted to this day by oral teaching and personal example; most of the old artists have now passed away and the professional troupe's personnel are ageing with a break between generations, so the genre faces an endangered situation. Its single-stage plays preserve the primitive operatic form, the short plays mostly portraying lowly people and the full-length plays mostly telling romances and myths, giving it value for the study of operatic morphology, folklore and local dialect and custom; facing ageing artists and a generational gap, Linchuan district relies on the training institute to sustain the genre through reviving plays and school programmes. Wan An'an (as recorded in the official dossier of an associated inheritor): female, Han, born in October 1941 in Linchuan county, Jiangxi. A national first-grade actor. In 1955 she entered the Fuzhou city caicha opera troupe and, under the guidance of the old artists Xu Kuigao, Rao Shoukui and Li Deliang, learned to sing the bendiao, Fudiao and nearly a hundred small and miscellaneous tunes and studied more than twenty traditional excerpts. She specialises in the huadan role, her voice clear and sweet, her vocal production refined and richly “tea-flavoured” and full of spirit. Under her leadership the Fuzhou caicha opera troupe has inherited tradition while constantly breaking through, rehearsing new pieces and restoring old ones, entering a golden period of development. She is a representative inheritor of caicha opera (Fuzhou caicha opera) in the fourth batch of national intangible cultural heritage projects and won the Jiangxi outstanding young actor award in 1961.
05 · Associated Representative Bearers
Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:
- Chen Shengqiang 02-0595
- Li Jiagao 03-1057
- Chen Binmao 04-1647
- Wan Anan 04-1648
- Wu Yancheng 04-1649
- Peng Jinhua 05-2376
- Wu Lan
- Chu Fengrong
- Fei Lijun
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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