Hunan Opera

Name of China's national intangible cultural heritage: Hunan Opera

Applicant: Guiyang County, Hunan Province

Item No.: 728

Project No.: Ⅳ - 127

Time of publication: 2008 (second batch)

Category: Traditional Drama

Region: Hunan Province

Type: new item

Applicant: Guiyang County, Hunan Province

Protection unit: Hunan opera protection and inheritance center of Guiyang County

Introduction to Hunan Opera:

Applicant: Guiyang County, Hunan Province

Hunan opera is one of the local operas in Hunan Province. It has a history of nearly 600 years. It is mainly popular in Changsha City, Xiangtan City, Zhuzhou City and Guiyang County. Because of the different popular regions, it can be divided into Changsha Hunan opera, Hengyang Hunan opera and so on.

Hunan opera has four major tunes: high tune, Tan tune, Kun tune and low tune. It has rich strike score and stage music. Its program is rigorous. Its performance, costumes and facial makeup all have a unique local style of Hunan.

There are many traditional operas of Hunan opera, most of which are from southern operas of song and Yuan Dynasties, Zaju of Yuan Dynasty and legends of Ming and Qing Dynasties, and a few are created and adapted by artists. There are more than 1000 operas of different sizes, of which more than 98% are Gao Qiang and Luan Tan operas. The representative operas include "the moon worship", "Jinyin", "Touji", "Pipa Ji", "Baitu Ji", etc. Gao Qiang's "four series" and "six series" are the representative works with the earliest performance time and the longest retention time.