Zhou Yan: The Shadow of Qiu Shengrong

In the Republic of China, the performance of Peking Opera flower face industry is known as the so-called "Jin Hao Hou", which refers to the three flower face actors with the highest artistic achievements at that time: Jin Shaoshan, Hao Shouchen, Hou Xirui, Jin Shaoshan has the best voice, Hao Shouchen is first-class, and Hou Xirui is beautiful. After the three gradually withdrew from the stage, the most outstanding flower-faced actor in LiYuanxing was Qiu Shengrong. Qiu's voice is mellow, and the table is also quite commendable, and some classic gongjia plays such as "Horse Theft" can also cope with it freely (the only plays that emphasize white and do school, such as "Famen Temple" and "YangpingGuan" are slightly insufficient). It is precisely because of its comprehensiveness that almost all the flower-faced actors who have influenced later generations, qiu Shengrong's followers and their re-transmission disciples, have continued until now, such as Qiu's hand-held apprentice Fang Rongxiang, Tianjin's three major flower faces, Kang Wansheng, Deng Muwei, and Meng Guanglu, all of which are in line with Qiu and Fang, so Pear Garden has the term "Ten Pure Nine Qiu".

Of course, the flower-faced actors of Qiu Shengrong's contemporaries are not without merit, but most of them are not as comprehensive as Qiu Shengrong, so their reputation is not obvious (except for Yuan Shiqiao, who has a high political status). For example, Zhao Wenkui, Lou Zhenkui, and Wang Quankui, who are known as the "Copper Hammer Three Kui". Sankui's advantages are obvious, that is, his voice is good, but "he can't do it", of which Wang Quankui's influence is greater, in the late 1940s and early 1950s, he worked with Zhang Junqiu and Yang Baosen in Hong Kong, leaving a lot of precious recordings, such as "Royal Orchard", "Catching and Releasing Cao", "Caoqiaoguan" and so on. After 1949, Zhao Wenkui and Lou Zhenkui mainly cooperated with Ye Shenglan, Li Hezeng, Li Shaochun, Du Jinfang, Yuan Shihai, etc. At that time, the recordings left by the Beijing Opera House at that time, such as "White Gate Tower", "Yuanmen Shooting", "Legend of the White Snake" and other recordings, were not lacking in the figure of Erkui, especially Lou Zhenkui, who was created with Jing Rongqing in "The Battle of Chibi" in 1959, and now seems to be a classic.

At that time, Qiu Shengrong's Beijing Opera Troupe also had many good faces, but because of Qiu Shengrong's fame, he was not able to pick a big beam. The first thing to mention here is Zhou Hetong, the older generation of actors think that Mr. Zhou is a good flower face second only to Qiu Shengrong, and the most successful role he has created is undoubtedly Hu Chuankui in "Sha Jiabang". But pushing forward, the plays of Ma Lianliang, Tan Fuying and others are mostly used by Zhou Hetong's green leaves, such as Liu Chang in "Ten Old An Liu", Taishi in "Asking Qiao Noisy Mansion", and every time the big cooperative drama "Dragon and Phoenix Chengxiang", Zhou sings Sun Quan, Qiu sings Zhang Fei. Compared with Zhou and Tong, Zhang Hongxiang's influence at that time was slightly inferior, but Zhang Hongxiang also had a very good role, that is, Tu Anjia in "The Orphan of Zhao", and Zhang has always been thinking about this role in his later years, thinking that it is a masterpiece of his life. In fact, many of Zhang's roles are extremely outstanding, such as playing the judge in "Judge Qiu Shengrong" and playing Ma Mo for Tan Fuying's "Lost Space", saying that the skill of knowing the enemy is slightly exaggerated, but it does add a lot. At that time, there was also a flower face called Zhang Yunbin, who sang two roads and three roads most of the time, such as Qiu Shengrong's "Yao Period", Zhang Yunbin played Yao Gang, Tan Fuying's "Zhu Trace" supported Li Ren (one of Hou Xirui's unique skills), Zhao Yanxia's "Bibo Fairy" played Bao Zheng, and some others such as Xu Sheng of "Borrowing the East Wind", and the doorman of "The Case of Zhenmei", which is basically a dragon set.

At that time, the flower faces used by Yang Baosen in Tianjin were mainly Jin Shaochen, Zhao Bingxiao and Li Rongwei, Yang's "Lost Space Chop" and "Great Detective II", most of the time using gold, sometimes using Zhao (because Zhao toured with the Tianjin Peking Opera Troupe for a while). Moreover, Zhao lived until he was a hundred years old, and his artistic life was extremely long. However, the first two basically did not act in modern dramas, and Li Rongwei was familiar with the audience because of the Hu Er portrayed in "Six Doors", especially the "Seller" and his singing was widespread.

In the 1980s, many good-faced actors passed away. Zhou Hetong also accompanied Tan Yuanshou in the early 1980s with "Playing Gold Bricks", I listened to the recording, the strength has not been as good as before, and then Yao Zongru arranged "Playing Gold Bricks" for Tan Yuanshou, when Yao also accompanied Ma Changli to sing "Wu Zixu", sensational Hong Kong, and became Tan Yuanshou's right hand and left arm in one fell swoop. Zhang Hongxiang, who is slightly older than Yao, and others have gradually faded out of the stage because of retirement, and in the environment of "abdication of the gods", Yuan Shihai has gradually become the most prestigious flower-faced actor in the 1980s and 1990s. Yuan Guolin and Jing Rongqing, who are half a generation younger than him, although their artistic achievements are basically different from each other' advantages, they really cannot be compared with Yuan in popularity, and it is precisely because of this that they reflect the decline of Qiu Shengrong's flower face industry. Fortunately, the big waves swept away the sand, leaving a shang changrong, and the shadow of the ten pure nine qiu of Peking Opera, there was another bright color.