15 Facts About Peking opera

The repertoire of Peking opera includes over 1, 400 works, which are based on Chinese history, folklore and, increasingly, contemporary life.

Traditional Peking opera was denounced as "feudalistic" and "bourgeois" during the Cultural Revolution and replaced mostly with the revolutionary operas until the period's end.

In recent years, Peking opera has responded to sagging audience numbers by attempting reforms, including improving performance quality, adapting new performance elements, shortening works, and performing new and original plays.

The tune of Peking opera is extremely similar to that of Han opera, therefore Han opera is widely known as the Mother of Peking opera.

Thus, Peking opera is not a monolithic form, but rather a coalescence of many older forms.

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The popularity of Peking opera has been attributed to the simplicity of the form, with only a few voices and singing patterns.

In September 1990, when the Kuomintang government participated in a state-sponsored mainland cultural event for the first time, a Taiwanese Peking opera group was sent, possibly to emphasize "Taiwaneseness".

Furthermore, the archaic language of Peking opera required productions to use electronic subtitles, which hampered the development of the form.

The four skills of Peking opera are not separate, but rather should be combined in a single performance.

Traditional Peking opera stages were built above the line of sight of the viewers, but some modern stages have been constructed with higher audience seating.

Vocal production in Peking opera is conceived of as being composed of "four levels of song": songs with music, verse recitation, prose dialogue, and non-verbal vocalizations.

In Chinese Peking opera, breath is based in the pubic region and supported by the abdominal muscles.

Songs in Peking opera are proscribed by a set of common aesthetic values.

The arias of Peking opera can be further divided into those of the and varieties.

In 2017, Li Wenrui wrote in China Daily that 10 masterpieces of the traditional Peking opera repertoire are The Drunken Concubine, Monkey King, Farewell My Concubine, A River All Red, Wen Ouhong's Unicorn Trapping Purse, White Snake Legend, The Ruse of the Empty City (from Romance of the Three Kingdoms), Du Mingxin's Female Generals of the Yang Family, Wild Boar Forest, and The Phoenix Returns Home.