Mulian Opera (Huizhou Mulian Opera)

Name of China's national intangible cultural heritage: Mulian Opera (Huizhou Mulian Opera)

Applicant: Qimen County, Anhui Province

Project No.: 231

Project No.: Ⅳ - 87

Time of publication: 2006 (the first batch)

Category: Traditional Drama

Region: Anhui Province

Type: new item

Applicant: Qimen County, Anhui Province

Protected by: Qimen County Cultural Center

Brief introduction of Mulian Opera (Huizhou Mulian Opera)

Applicant: Qimen County, Anhui Province

Mulian opera is a kind of opera performance preserved in folk activities. It gets its name because it mainly plays the story of saving Mulian's mother. The story of Mulian's saving his mother was first recorded in Buddhist classics. The main content is as follows: Fu Xiang gave aid to the lonely and poor all his life, zhaibu monks and Taoists, and was granted the title of Empress Dowager. Fu's wife Liu Shi Qing Ti (also known as Liu Si Niang) disrespected the gods, broke the precepts and killed animals. After her death, she was sent to hell. In order to save his mother, his son, Fu Luobu, went to the west to seek Buddha's transcendence. The Buddha felt for him and allowed him to convert to Salmonella, changed his name to Damu Qianlian, and gave him the Yulan basin Sutra and the staff. Mulian went through all kinds of difficulties and dangers in hell, and finally found his mother and his family. For hundreds of years, after the training of countless artists, Mulian opera has been popular among the people with its extensive and complicated dramatic forms, all inclusive performance means, profound music materials, blending of feelings and scenes, and interactive performance. It was once widely spread in Anhui, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Jiangxi, Hubei, Hunan, Sichuan, Shanxi, Fujian, Henan and other places.

During the Wanli period of Ming Dynasty, Zheng Zhizhen, a native of Qingxi in Qimen, Anhui Province, wrote a new drama of saving Mu Lian's mother and persuading her to be good on the basis of past dramas, Bianwen and legends. As soon as the Mulian opera was produced, it was widely spread in Qimen, Xiuning, Shitai, Wuyuan, Shexian and other places. Originally, there was no fixed venue for the performance of Qilian opera, which was accompanied by drums, gongs and cymbals instead of orchestras. Its basic singing style is simple, which is the "Huichi elegant tune" popular in Huizhou area in the middle of Ming Dynasty, namely Huizhou tune and Qingyang tune. The characters are divided into three types: Sheng, Dan, Mo, Jing, Za and Jin, and the facial makeup includes ghost face, standard face and painted face. The performance absorbed some skills of folk martial arts and juggling, such as walking rope, jumping circle, fleeing fire, fleeing sword, pedaling table, rolling and so on. These special performance skills were skillfully integrated into the plot and became the special moves of martial arts performance, which laid the foundation for the later martial arts performance of huiban. Most of the performing troupes are organized by clans, that is to say, a troupe is composed of people of the same clan, and no one with a different surname is allowed to join. There are two forms of performance in Mulian Opera: one is that the actors act directly, which is called "big Mulian"; the other is that the actors sing with puppets, which is called "tuomulian". Generally, spring and autumn are the most popular seasons. There are "DaoWang opera" (harvest in autumn), "Tanghui opera" (held in court every five or ten years), "temple fair opera" (chaojiuhua mountain), "Ping'an opera" and "Xianghuo opera" (Huanyuan). The singing time is one, four, seven or ten days.