There are more than 260 kinds of local dramas in China. It is a large number of local operas with rich connotations and many participants that have made China a great drama country and won great attention and strong support from the state and governments at all levels. In July 20 15, the State Council issued 2 1 of "Several Policies on Supporting the Inheritance and Development of Traditional Opera", 4 items are directly related to local operas, including conducting a general survey of local operas, building a data information system, implementing a conservation and inheritance project, strengthening the construction of talent teams for repertoires, incorporating them into the public cultural service system, and encouraging social forces to participate extensively. After a lapse of nearly four years, we can regard the performance of local operas in the 12th Art Festival as the initial achievements after the implementation of some policies. I believe that with the continuous implementation of some policies, local operas will glow with greater vitality and show better style in Chinese art festivals.
As we all know, local opera is the product of ancient farming civilization in China. On the one hand, the vast territory, numerous nationalities, inconvenient transportation and self-sufficiency in social life make regional cultural varieties such as dialects, folk customs, literature and art present extremely diverse faces; On the other hand, after long-term unification and universal systematic enlightenment, different regional cultures have roughly the same cultural background and basically the same aesthetic orientation. As a combination of dialect, folklore and folk literature and art, local opera is between the above two aspects, and with the development of economy, society, culture and education, exchanges, competition, integration and evolution are constantly taking place in the fields of repertoire, skills, performance and market. This process used to be very slow, but it began to accelerate at the beginning of last century, and great changes took place in the middle and late last century. Due to the social transformation from agricultural villages to industrial and commercial cities in modern China, the rapid development of economy and culture and the rapid narrowing of regional differences, many local operas accelerated the process of extinction or integration.
From the overall trend, the disappearance of many local operas is inevitable, but from the specific situation, some naturally disappear because of their own vitality, while others naturally merge after interaction, and the result is generally to expand rather than narrow the influence.
The former case should be protected under the framework of "non-legacy"; For the latter phenomenon, we should respect the objective law, treat it rationally, be optimistic about its success, follow the trend and should not interfere too much. It must be noted that local operas not only belong to local areas, but also to the whole country, just as traditional operas not only belong to the past, but also to the present and future. From the perspective of protection and inheritance, it is necessary for local operas to maintain their "locality", but from the perspective of promotion and development, it is extremely natural for local operas to pursue their "nationwide". In fact, there has never been a local drama that doesn't want to gain national influence, just because each drama has different abilities, conditions, opportunities and efforts, so the results are different. Looking back at history, all local operas that have gained national influence have, without exception, experienced the phenomenon of original ecology dilution and local restoration.
This also exists more or less in the local opera works of the Twelfth Art Festival, either explicitly or implicitly. Protection is by no means equal to conservatism. The key to the survival and development of local operas lies in how to grasp a degree, not only to retain local characteristics, but also to embody national pursuit as much as possible through "operas", especially original works.
The "place" of local operas mainly refers to the regional size of popular operas, including professional groups, employees and audience numbers. There are "grand opera" and "small opera" in the industry, which have roughly the same meaning. Take Henan Opera and Su Ju as examples. Henan Opera is popular in more than ten provinces, and there are professional troupes as far away as Xinjiang and Taiwan Province. There are nearly 2,500 state-owned and private literary and art groups, with more than 654.38 million employees and a roughly estimated audience of 30 million. The above data is the highest among local operas, and it is worthy of the title of "the first local opera in China".
Su Ju originated in Suzhou and was only popular in Wudi. There are only 100 troupes with less than 1 00 employees. It is a real "little drama". Many operas influence and interact with each other. Among them, in the process of expanding its influence, "big operas" will not only squeeze the living space of local "small operas", but also be alienated by regional culture to produce new operas. For example, Shaanxi Opera originated in Shaanxi with a long history and great influence. When it was pushed eastward, there were many local bangzi operas like plants. The award-winning Hebei Bangzi ("Li Baoguo") is a variation of Hebei Shaanxi Opera about 200 years ago.