"Staying at home in the fight against the epidemic, we work together to protect Shanghai..." In March, Ding Xiaofrog, who had just finished performing consecutive performances, returned to his Douyin live broadcast room without stopping. She adapted bi pai's classic "Red Doctor" and other singing segments into an "anti-epidemic version" to cheer for epidemic prevention, and also connected with other opera actors online and organized group concerts to bring rare relaxation to the audience who also fought the epidemic at home in the live broadcast room.
"I have a legacy responsibility on my shoulders." Ding Xiao frog, a first-class actress, is a famous character on the stage of Yue opera, and as the inheritor of Bi Pai, she has been exploring the innovation of modern Yue opera.
Ding Xiaofrog began to perform on stage at the age of 12 and is recognized as one of the best Bi Pai descendants of the Mesozoic Era. In the more than 30 years of Yue opera performances, she has made breakthroughs in the three kingdoms drama on the stage, starring in many major plays, and now, she has focused all her energy on the inheritance and development of Yue opera - overseas tours, public welfare teaching, and the popularization of online performances.
Online group singing
After interrupting her overseas tour due to the epidemic in 2020, she found a new way to inherit opera in the live broadcast room of Douyin (@Yue Opera Bipai Xiaosheng Ding Xiaofrog). As long as she has time, she will turn on the live broadcast to let the fans feast their ears. In the official live broadcast room of the Shanghai Yue Theatre, Ding Xiaofrog also often appeared as an anchor. She encouraged her peers and juniors to actively explore new ideas for the dissemination of opera, and under her influence, the disciples also entered Douyin to broadcast live.
Ding Xiaofrog said: "Attracting new audiences to pay attention to Yue opera, this niche traditional culture really has new vitality, which is the most valuable value of live broadcasting at present." ”
A tradition of genres
Ding Xiaofrog was born in 1972 in Yueqing, Zhejiang. Due to her excellent voice and height, she was selected by the Yueqing Yue Opera Troupe at the age of 14 and sent to Shengzhou Art School for further study. In 1988, Ding Xiaofrog entered the Yueqing Yue Opera Troupe, and in those years, the Yue opera performance market in Jiangsu and Zhejiang was very popular, and she had two performances almost every day. At that time, she sang Yin Pai, and when she was in her 20s, she became the head of the troupe.
In 1995, Ding Xiaofrog took the opportunity to visit relatives in Shanghai and went straight to the Shanghai Jing'an Yue Opera Troupe to see the long-awaited Yue opera masters. By chance, she met two leaders of the Jing'an Yue Opera Troupe there, and the two leaders wanted to introduce Ding Xiaofrog as a talent to Shanghai, and the famous teacher Bi Chunfang, whom she had admired for a long time, also paid attention to her talent during the interview. Shanghai's strong Yue opera atmosphere attracted Ding Xiaofrog, and she decided to leave her hometown to "drift in Shanghai".
Subsequently, Ding Xiaofrog was officially introduced to the Shanghai Jing'an Yue Opera Troupe. The first drama in the row was the big challenge - she had to change her studies to the Bi School in more than a month, and the person responsible for guiding her was Bi Chunfang's eldest disciple Yang Wenwei.
In the first performance in September, Ding Xiaofrog won the recognition of the audience, believing that she had a good inheritance of Bi Pai's singing voice. Bi Chunfang decided to accept Ding Xiaofrog as an apprentice, Bi Pai has not accepted new students for many years, and Bi Chunfang saw the confidence of "successors" in Ding Xiaofrog at that time. At the behest of her mentor, she made rapid progress.
But within a few years, the performance market had become sluggish and the troupe's operations had become difficult. After entering the Shanghai Yue Theatre, as the only Bi Pai Xiaosheng here, she was faced with the situation of no drama to perform, and the few performance opportunities were just to run the dragon set. The huge contrast overwhelmed her, and it went on for two years.
The inheritance of various genres of Yue opera is not easy, and the actors have some feelings of pity for each other. Before the performance of "Butterfly Dream" starring Wang Zhiping, the original Xiaosheng actor was absent for some reason, she invited Ding Xiaofrog to pick liang to save the scene, this opportunity became a turning point in Ding Xiaofrog's opera career, since then, she has played more and more opportunities to play as the protagonist, and Bi Pai sang Shanghai again. This made Bi Chunfang feel relieved and felt that she had not looked at the wrong person that year.
After the dissolution of the Jing'an Yue Opera Troupe, a large part of the pressure on the protection, inheritance and development of Bi Pai's art fell on the two masters and apprentices, and Bi Chunfang passed on his experience orally, not sparing the details of each rehearsal. In 2016, Ding Xiaofrog wanted to play Bi Pai's classic "Selling Oil Lang", and Bi Chunfang, who was 90 years old at the time, also urged Ding Xiaofrog to specifically find small traders who bought breakfast to observe their mood on the ground.
For several years, Ding Xiaofrog and Enshi were in love with mother and daughter, after the death of Enshi, Ding Xiaofrog felt sad and sorted out her emotions, and she threw herself into a series of performances to commemorate Enshi, and the heavy responsibility of inheritance was taken over.
Press pause the Yue opera performance and restart it in the live broadcast room
The inheritance and development of Yue opera is the starting point for Ding Xiao frog to engage in all his work.
In the eyes of theater fans, Ding Xiaofrog, a national first-class actor, is recognized as one of the best Bi Pai descendants of the Mesozoic Era. So far, she has not only starred in many classic plays, but also created many new stage images. Everyone jokingly called her a "young actress", because she still has a great passion for her work, and has been touring overseas and domestic for a long time.
In 2015, she founded the public welfare Yue Opera Heritage Organization, Xujiahui Hanyue Children's Yue Opera Troupe, which is committed to cultivating the next generation of "Xiaoyue people".
In 2020, the outbreak of the new crown epidemic, offline performances and events were cancelled. Work suspension, unable to rehearse, performance, for opera actors is an anxious thing, the most direct impact is the income of the actors, some private theater troupe actors directly face the dilemma of zero income, professional troupe actors can only receive basic salary. Many Yue opera actors have played vibrato live broadcast at home, which not only attracted the attention of netizens, but also eased the economic pressure of many people.
Ding Xiaofrog's students broadcast live for a few days, and they thought it was funny, so they suggested that the teacher also try it. She's posted some short videos on Douyin before, but she doesn't play much. At first, she didn't dare to try live broadcasting, thinking that it was something that young people were playing. The students told her that there were many people watching the live broadcast, and she thought it was very good, which was a fresh stage for the opera, and she encouraged the students: "Since some people are watching, let's broadcast it well." ”
Stayed at home for a while, and did not know when the epidemic would end, when can go out, Ding Xiao frog thought, then when it is at home to practice singing, in the absence of professional equipment, she took the mobile phone in her hand, with the front camera to start broadcasting, the first time just held the mobile phone in the live broadcast room for an hour, did not expect that there were more than 2,000 people to cheer.
"It's very foreign." She thought it was fun to talk to the audience and sing, but at first it always felt like a show, and it was very formal as soon as it started. Unlike the performance on stage, the live broadcast needs to interact with the fans more, at first some fans felt that ding xiao frog such a national actor seems to be not grounded enough, and they will not interact much, Ding Xiao frog then go to see how other Yue opera actors broadcast, slowly relax, sing for a while, chat for a while. Sitting at home in the winter, nervous and sweaty.
Later, she also added professional microphones and sound cards, and through a period of live broadcasting, more and more fans, both old fans who are familiar with her and new fans. After the resumption of offline performances, part of Ding Xiaofrog's energy returned to the work of the troupe, but as long as she had time, she would open the live broadcast to see, especially the younger generation of Yue opera actors, she paid special attention.
After discovering the help of live broadcasting for the dissemination of opera, Ding Xiaofrog began to suggest that more students join, and all three of her students insisted on doing live broadcasting outside of work with her support. Last year, she had stopped broadcasting for a while, but in order to guide the students, she started broadcasting again, accompanied by students to broadcast continuously, and the number of people in the live broadcast room rose to seven or eight hundred.
Students are working in their respective troupes, Ding Xiaofrog sometimes interacts with students on Douyin, sees what the problem is, and directly teaches singing online, which is unexpectedly convenient. The highly professional interaction has also attracted many fans. She will be particularly happy to see the Yue opera anchor with a special number of fans on Douyin, and the data shows the trend of Yue opera from niche to public online.
Now that there are fewer offline performance opportunities, and the development of young people in the troupe is very hard, Ding Xiaofrog feels that live broadcasting has indeed made up for their regret of lack of stage opportunities and given them more confidence in sticking to the opera industry.
The new audience is the vitality
The theory and spirit of Bi Pai's "relaxed performance, relaxed singing voice, and relaxed state" are deeply rooted in Ding Xiao frog's heart, and for students, she is not only a strict teacher with high professional requirements, but also a backing for various supports in her career.
She paid attention to the fact that the young anchors are also more able to attract the attention of young audiences, she encourages young people to stick to it, when the traffic is not high, the students are also a little frustrated, she is very clear, we must stick to the online communication, the new audience into the live broadcast room, and then into the theater, to really bring new vitality to Yue opera.
When Ding Xiaofrog was live, many viewers were old fans of Yue opera, and they "met" the famous character Ding Xiaofrog on Douyin, which was particularly surprising. Many fans brushed gifts for her in the live broadcast room, and she was a little too careless to go, always asking fans to "not brush so much".
In recent years, the offline opera performance market has been very difficult. Some Yue opera actors have no choice but to change careers in the case of "no drama to act", as a senior, Ding Xiaofrog is also very heartbroken, but his livelihood is indeed the dilemma encountered by many actors. She and her apprentices exchanged information about the live broadcast and learned that the reward income of the live broadcast could be similar to their income in the troupe. Relying on live broadcasting, the sharp decline in income of many opera actors after the epidemic has been alleviated, so that the originally confused young actors have the confidence to continue to stick to this profession.
This year, Ding Xiaofrog was busy touring and did not broadcast live for a while. She did not forget to invite the partners of the troupe to shoot a short video and post it on Douyin to promote their offline performances. Fans who had not seen her for a long time in the live broadcast room saw the news of the performance and walked into the theater.
In March, the performance came to an end and she returned to Shanghai to rest. Seeing that the live broadcast equipment at home was messed up and wanted to re-debug, she couldn't help but debug the equipment and prepare to start broadcasting again. Seeing that the epidemic prevention situation in Shanghai was grim, she quickly organized a group concert in the live broadcast room and accompanied the online netizens in the form of live broadcast.
In the "2021 Douyin Data Report" released in January this year, Yue opera ranked second in the "Top Ten Most Popular Intangible Cultural Heritage Projects", and the popularity of Yue opera online made Ding Xiaofrog see the hope of The spread of Yue opera. On April 14, 2022, Douyin released the Xiqu Support Plan, which will help 10 theater groups and 1,000 professional opera actors to build a second theater in the coming year and inherit and promote traditional opera culture. It is conceivable that this initiative will help the opera art to better develop and pass on the online stage.
Previously, Ding Xiaofrog had to perform several times abroad every year, and in recent years, because of the epidemic, overseas performances have been difficult to go. Actors who are overseas have recently told Ding Xiaofrog that they are envious of her in China and can sing Yue opera live on Douyin, and they also want to interact with fans in the live broadcast.
In Ding Xiaofrog's view, opera is still a very niche art in the world, and for an art to be better developed and inherited, the most important thing is that more people will promote and spread it.
In the work of cultivating talents and promoting dissemination, Ding Xiaofrog spared no effort, and the troupe also opened an official live broadcast room, she not only broadcast herself, but also actively in the live broadcast room of the troupe and relatives and friends. "For the spread of Yue opera culture, breaking the restrictions of region and age, and attracting thousands of audiences at once, this stage is very meritorious."
Source: Qianjiang Evening News Hourly News All-Media Editing Center Integrated Douyin
Duty Editor: Zhou Qin