Talking about the development and evolution of the fraction itself of the Chinese opera art, it is the important segment of the history of Chinese opera that can not be separate.Fraction means the character and style of the artist representing on the stage.Such personality and style, due to learning and mimic by the students and passed down.In the development process of Chinese opera, due to the performing artist of each profession competed drastically, thus various fractions emerged.For instance, the four major famous tan: Mei,. Cheng, Shang, and Xun; and the four major beard sheng: Yu , Ma, Ian, Tan, and so on.Due to the various fractions of each profession in the Chinese opera, it is too many to list them all.Below we only briefly introduced the four major beard sheng and famous tan.

Four Major Beard Sheng﹝Shu-Ian Yu│.Ju-Peng Ian│.Fu-Ing Tan│.Lian-Liang Ma﹞

 

<<Shu-Ian Yu（1906—1977）>>

He was born in Chinese opera family, and went on the stage when he was only 15 and gained success.His voice was very rhythmic, strong but indirect; and his martial art gong fu is solid with neat and touching performance.His singing art has certain degree of influence to the elderly sheng fraction after 1930’s.

 

 

<<Ju-Peng Ian（1890－1942）>>

 

As Mongolian, he used to work for Mongolian Tibet Office in Qing Dynasty, later officially joined opera group.In the beginning, he was famous as beard sheng. Later, according to his unique vocal, he absorbed the reading and singing techniques of Qing I, Xiao sheng and Beijing rhythm bass drum to create new vocal with high and low peak.He was very neat and full of performance power, noticed to employ change of vocal style to represent different characters.

 

 

<<Fu-Ing Tan（1906—1977）>>

Fu-Ing Tanwas born in Chinese opera family, with the art cultivation by grandpa and his father.When he was little, he was taught by the famous teacher Chang0Hua Xiao to play elderly sheng.After schooling, he was taught by Chinese opera master Shu-Ian Yu.He has solid foundation in singing and martial art, especially good at kao ba opera.

 

<<Lian-Liang Ma（1901－1966）>>

 

Ma Fraction based on Lian-Liang Ma is one of the most influential lao sheng fractions.Lian-Liang Ma learned with plenty former artists to form unique feature as Ma fraction.Lian-Liang Ma’s voice was round and pure, singing comfortably and with ease.His performance was light and gentle.In terms of arrangement of opera title, ma fraction was full of innovation, not only constantly launching newly adopted opera, but also good at adoption of traditional operas.It paid great attention to costume, properties, and beautification of stage.

Four Famous Tan﹝Mei Fraction│.Cheng Fraction│.Shang Fraction│.Xun Fraction﹞

◎Mei Fraction (1894—1961)

Lan-Fang Mei, born in Chinese opera family, good at qing I , also played as martial tan.Lan-Fang Mei conducted entire and rich innovation on vocal, reading, dancing, music, costume, and make-up of tan role.He raised the performance art of tan in Chinese opera.Vocal of Mei’s fraction is smooth and comfortable, not using flowery trembling voice, sliding voice or strange vocal.In the first hearing, it seemed plain and nothing special, but actually it is deep and subtle, very touching.In terms of dancing, Mei’s fraction did plenty bold creation.Such as the silk dance in “The Flower-Scattering Angel”, dish dance in “Tai Zhen Episode”, and sword dance in “The Emperor Bids Farewell to His Favorite Concubine” and so on.In terms of costume and appearance, it referred to ancient lady portrait and goddess sculpture to create ancient skirt and hair style and hair accessories.In terms of music, added Er Hu in the accompanied instruments to enrich the performance power of music.Lan-Fang Mei had led the Chinese opera group to Japan, USA and Russia to joint performance for many times.He was the international-well known opera performing artist that spread Chinese opera overseas.

 

◎Cheng Fraction (1904—1958)

Ian-Qiu Cheng had learned opera from Lan-Fang Mei since he was little, and played qing I.He was brave to innovate and change in art.Cheng Fraction was good at trembling voice with special utterance and vocal skills to create sad, subtle, deep and indirect vocal that was good for creating female image with miserable fate, gentle outward but tough inner side.In addition, the long sleeve gong fu of Cheng Fraction is sublime.There is a ten-word tip: “gou, tiao, cheng, chong, bo, iang, dan, shuai, da, dou” that each usage has plenty changes can be precisely express the emotion of the character.

 

◎Shang Fraction(1900—1976)

Xiao-Un Shang , who learned opera in the opera group when he was little.And when he was 14-year-old, was criticized as the No. 1 child tan.He learned wu sheng at first, later changed to learn zheng tan, also played dao ma tan.Shang fraction with loud and clear voice and wide vocal area, and good at using trembling sound with long air, not to tired nor died out.Audience listened happily.The reading of Shang fraction was clear and loud and full of emotion, especially the strongness, toughness, and bitterness of Jing Pai is excellent.The span of performance and gesture were larger with strong and accurate tempo.Due to learned wu sheng, Xiao-Un Shang had swift gesture and body, when played tight kao dao ma tan, such as the handsome heroine “Double Sun Princess,” ”Xiang River Meeting,” “Fighting Jin Mt.” received most praises.As to his short fight opera or counter-acted as martial wu sheng , wu xiao sheng, also got good criticism.

 

◎Xun Fraction (1900—1968)

Hui-Sheng Xun, learned art in the he bei bang Ze opera group when he was little, and changed to play Chinese opera in his 19 year old, as hua tan and dao ma tan.He was good at creating lovely and naive passionate young girl that has soft and beautify indirect flavor.His vocal was good at small trembling voice, semi note and decorating voice, and often used nose sound to end up the vocal.In terms of performance, he was very neat and beautiful but lively.He further added many small gestures, such as side up head, closing tightly lips, per truing tongue, using mouth to hold handkerchief, twisting towel, and so on.With the employment of eyesight, the fraction fully expressed the psychological activities of young girl and young lady.On the performance of gesture and figure, the fraction required actor to stand straight with chest up, shrinking bottom in, waist straight, shoulder down naturally, and straight bodies to represent cubic line of sense of beauty.

 

Reference:
Sorted by the research team from the Guoguang Opera Company website
http://www.kk.gov.tw/
Source of Photos:
Guoguang Opera Company http://www.kk.gov.tw/
Gui-Zhe Su, Development of Chinese Opera and Taiwanese Opera Under the National Policy, Wen-She-Zhe Publisher, 2003.
Chinese Opera http://big5.china.com.cn/culture/zhuanti/zgjj/node_7031699_3.htm

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