Shaoxing, in present-day Zhejiang, was the capital of the ancient state of Yue. The city has been a commercial and cultural center throughout history, and thus has had an important role in the development of Chinese drama.
Various musical styles from different regions arrived in Shaoxing at the end of the Ming and beginning of the Qing dynasties. One of those styles was from Yiyang, a city in the southern province of Jiangxi. Yiyang music was predominantly percussive and immensely popular. The other style was luantan, a clapper opera technique accompanied primarily by strings. One of the most influential singing styles in the sixteenth century came out of the nearby town of Yuyao. In the Ming dynasty, a seated storyteller used the yuyao singing style with a percussion accompaniment to present a story, taking different roles as it unfolded. Shaoxing theatre companies that adopted this storytelling technique for opera became known as "high melodic" troupes. Performers in Shaoxing blended these musical systems into the local singing style, but before long the clapper style dominated. This regional opera was even called Shaoxing Clapper Opera for a time.
Shaoxing Opera is accompanied primarily by the wooden fiddle and sometimes supported by the small lute. The music is forceful and the singing style is exaggerated. Actors are not strictly limited by the music, but can embellish their arias according to the mood of the scene. Acting technique is characterized by large, bold gestures and stylized martial arts based on a local fighting method. Actors use a full voice range from the natural to the falsetto. This larger-than-life performance style and energetic music is particularly suitable for the Shaoxing Opera repertoire of historical pieces, many of which give the actors opportunity to display anger and portray struggle.
This operatic form established itself in Shanghai early in the twentieth century to become a leading theatrical style there. Its heyday was short-lived, however, as the Shaoxing Opera began to lose its audience to both the fresh Yue Opera and the popular Peking Opera.
Various musical styles from different regions arrived in Shaoxing at the end of the Ming and beginning of the Qing dynasties. One of those styles was from Yiyang, a city in the southern province of Jiangxi. Yiyang music was predominantly percussive and immensely popular. The other style was luantan, a clapper opera technique accompanied primarily by strings. One of the most influential singing styles in the sixteenth century came out of the nearby town of Yuyao. In the Ming dynasty, a seated storyteller used the yuyao singing style with a percussion accompaniment to present a story, taking different roles as it unfolded. Shaoxing theatre companies that adopted this storytelling technique for opera became known as "high melodic" troupes. Performers in Shaoxing blended these musical systems into the local singing style, but before long the clapper style dominated. This regional opera was even called Shaoxing Clapper Opera for a time.
Shaoxing Opera is accompanied primarily by the wooden fiddle and sometimes supported by the small lute. The music is forceful and the singing style is exaggerated. Actors are not strictly limited by the music, but can embellish their arias according to the mood of the scene. Acting technique is characterized by large, bold gestures and stylized martial arts based on a local fighting method. Actors use a full voice range from the natural to the falsetto. This larger-than-life performance style and energetic music is particularly suitable for the Shaoxing Opera repertoire of historical pieces, many of which give the actors opportunity to display anger and portray struggle.
This operatic form established itself in Shanghai early in the twentieth century to become a leading theatrical style there. Its heyday was short-lived, however, as the Shaoxing Opera began to lose its audience to both the fresh Yue Opera and the popular Peking Opera.
