Tea Picking Opera

Name of China's national intangible cultural heritage: Tea Picking Opera

Applicant: Yangxin County, Hubei Province

Item No.: 209

Project No.: Ⅳ - 65

Time of publication: 2008 (second batch)

Category: Traditional Drama

Region: Hubei Province

Type: Extension Project

Applicant: Yangxin County, Hubei Province

Protection unit: Yangxin Tea Picking Opera inheritance Center

Introduction to Tea Picking Opera:

Applicant: Yangxin County, Hubei Province

Liuyang New Tea Picking Opera is one of the local operas in Hubei Province, mainly spread in Yangxin County. In the Qing Dynasty, the tune of foreign operas including Tea Picking Opera spread to Yangxin County along the Yangtze River waterway and the land route of Hubei and Jiangxi. Combined with the tea songs in Mufu mountain area, Yangxin Tea Picking Opera was formed in Daoguang period of the Qing Dynasty. At the end of the Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the Republic of China, Yangxin Tea Picking Opera made great progress under the influence of Zhu Hongshou, a Han Opera master from Yangxin, and spread to the surrounding counties. In 1965, Yangxin Tea Picking Opera Troupe was established, marking the maturity of Yangxin Tea Picking Opera.

The singing music of Yangxin Tea Picking Opera consists of three parts: positive tune, colorful tune and percussion tune. The positive tune belongs to plate style, including "northern tune", "Han tune", "Tan tune" and "Siping" tune, which has the characteristics of beautiful sound, strong plasticity and expressive force. The colorful tune includes more than 40 special minor interludes, and the small plays mainly with colorful tune are singing and dancing, and the performance is simple and unrestrained. Yangxin Tea Picking Opera is performed in dialect, with the help of human voice. The performance content is close to life, and the plot is simple and strong, which is deeply loved by the local people.

Yangxin Tea Picking Opera has many traditional operas, about more than 100 kinds. Over the past 40 years, Yangxin County Tea Picking Opera Troupe has rehearsed a large number of excellent plays, such as "San Gu Chu Gong", "Chuang Wang Sha Qing" and so on, some of which have won provincial performance awards.