RESULTADOS Y DISCUSIÓN
4.1.2. Correlaciones entre las variables
In 1790, the Three Celebrations 三慶徽班, a troupe organized and sponsored by Anhui merchants, entered Beijing as one of the major entertainments for Qianlong’s 80th birthday. It was a variety troupe, performing not only in the style of Anhui (the er- huang 二黃), but all sorts of popular tunes and Kunqu as well. Its assortment of styles and repertoire quickly won over the audience of the capital. The leading artist, Gao Langting 高朗亭, was described in the following words: “Even without singing, his imitation of a woman’s bearing - every twinkle and smile, every bodily movement – was unbelievably exquisite, the ultimate art.”“不必征歌，一顰一笑，一起一坐， 描摹雌軟神情，幾乎化境。”74 Many of the Qin-qiang actors, who were on the one
73Wu Changyuan 吳長元, Accounts of male Dan Actors《燕蘭小譜》juan 3, p. 9A, in Historical Materials on the Beijing Theatre in the Qing Dynasty清代燕都梨園史料(1996), vol. 1,as quoted inZhang and Guo, History, vol. III, p. 13.
74 My translation. From Xiaotiedi Daoren (The Master of the Little Steel Flute) 小鐵篴道人, Flowers of the Present
Day《目下看花記》, p. 14A, in Historical Materials, vol. 1. 化境is a traditional expression in Chinese aesthetics
to denote the “ultimate” state of artistic perfection. Qian Zhongshu錢鍾書 uses it in his essay on the translator Lin Qin’nan (Lin Shu), 林 紓 的 翻 譯, when he describes the best translations as belonging to this state of “transmutation”, where they read as though they are original works of literature, but are nonetheless “faithful” to their original text. See Jiuwen sipian 舊文四篇 (1979), p. 63, and the translation by George Kao in Renditions vol. 5, p. 9.
hand being held back by the government, and on the other hand were not able to compete with this new company, eventually joined the Anhui Troupe 徽秦合流.
By the 1810s, three other Anhui Troupes, the Four Delights 四喜, the Spring Stage 春台, the Gentle Spring 和春, arrived in Beijing one after another.75 Each troupe had a particular area in which it excelled: the full-length repertoire of the Three Celebrations 三慶曰軸子, the Kunqu of the Four Delights 四喜曰曲子, the martial skills of the Gentle Spring 和春曰把子, and the child performers of the Spring Stage 春台曰 孩子.76 As a result, the Four Great Anhui Troupes 四大徽班 dominated the Beijing theatrical world, and nurtured the rise and development of Jingju.
In 1828, the Han-diao 漢 調 (formerly known as Chu-diao 楚 調) of Hubei was introduced to Beijing. This was another indispensable factor for the emergence of Jingju. During the years 1828 to 1832, actors from Hubei arrived in Beijing one after the other. Yu Sansheng余三勝, Wang Honggui 王洪貴, and Li Liu李六 were among the most eminent. It was then difficult to set up an independent company and compete with the Anhui Troupes, which were still in their heyday. Like the actors of Qin-qiang before them, these newcomers performed with the Anhui Troupes 搭班. Their expertise, the xipi 西皮 style, as well as their repertoire, were a great contribution to the Anhui Troupes. The merger of the Hubei xipi and Anhui er-huang 徽漢合流 consequently gave birth to the “pihuang system” (or pihuang-qiang 皮黃腔), which later became the major singing style of Jingju.77
75These terms are all as translated by Dolby, p. 164.
76See Yang Maojian 楊懋建,〈夢華瑣簿〉in Historical Materials, p. 352. See also Colin Mackerras, The Rise of the Peking Opera 1770-1870 (1972), pp. 124-125.
Musical styles
Now let us have a brief look at the musical styles so far incorporated into the Anhui Troupes.
1. Qin-qiang 秦腔 (a branch of bangzi 梆子)
Qin-qiang originated in the north-western provinces of Shaanxi and Gansu. Bold and unconstrained, sonorous and passionate, this musical style embodied the characteristics and inner qualities of the people of Northwest China. It is recorded that when the 17th- century rebel General Li Zicheng “was offered the great beauty Chen Yuanyuan, he was so excited and happy that he asked her to sing for him. She sang a Kunqu aria. Li frowned and said: ‘How come such a beauty sings something so unbearable?’ He then ordered the ladies in his harem to sing the West Tune 西調 (another term for Qin-qiang) and to accompany themselves with plucked stringed instruments. Li clapped his hands in time with the melody. The music was so passionate and thrilling, it went straight to the heart.”78
…進圓圓。自成驚且喜，遽命歌，奏吳歈。自成蹙額曰：“何貌甚佳，而 音殊不可耐也！”即命群姬唱西調，操阮箏、琥珀，己拍掌以和之。繁音 激楚，熱耳酸心…
In order to fit the style, Qin-qiang did not use the sheng 笙 (a reed pipe wind instrument) and flute. Its major accompaniment was the huqin 胡琴, or two-stringed fiddle, which was supported by the round plucked instrument the yueqin 月琴. The huqin and yueqin remain the two most essential musical instruments in today’s Peking Opera or Jingju.
2. Xipi 西皮
The xipi style did not in fact originate in Hubei. It was a musical style based on Qin- qiang, which had been modified and developed in Hubei. As the Hubei dialect used to call lyrics (or songs) pi 皮, xipi means tunes coming from the West (or Northwest).
78My translation. Lu Ciyun陸次雲 (Kangxi reign), The Story of Yuanyuan《圓圓傳》in Literary Sketches in the Qing Dynasty《清代筆記小說》(1996), vol. 18, p. 434. See also Zhang and Guo, History, vol. III, p. 176.
These were the songs Li Zicheng wanted to hear (the xi-diao, or the West Tune). Although xipi ended up being a quite different style from Qin-qiang, it nevertheless kept its high-pitched and passionate quality.
3. Er-huang 二黃
The origin of er-huang is controversial. There are two major accounts. One is that the er-huang style was a further development of the siping-diao 四平調. Siping-diao was a derivation of Yiyang-qiang, integrated with Anhui folk tunes. However, it abandoned the basic structure of Yiyang-qiang (the tuge 徒歌and bangqiang幫腔, see above) and used musical instruments to accompany singing.
Another account is that er-huang originated from the county Yihuang 宜黃of Jiangxi province, as Yihuang had a regional style, named Yihuang-qiang 宜黃腔, which was very similar to the er-huang (some also said that in southern dialects, 二and 宜 sound the same, hence 宜黃 was mistakenly written as 二黃). Here I would like to add one very interesting remark: according to recent research, Tang Xianzu’s great plays (including The Peony Pavilion) were not written according to the prosodic rules of Kunqu, but rather, to those of Yihuang-qiang, a fusion of a Yiyang deviation 弋陽土腔 and the Haiyan style海鹽腔, which was then very popular around Tang’s native town.79 That was probably why Tang had once been bitterly criticized for not abiding by the rules of Kunqu, and for that matter, we have the so-called “fight between Tang and Shen” 湯沈之爭.80
4. Kunqu 崑曲
I have already dealt at some length with the musical style of Kunqu.
79 SeeZheng Peikai 鄭培凱, Tang Xianzu and Late Ming Culture《湯顯祖與晚明文化》(1995), pp. 241-242. 80Although Tang Xianzu (1550-1616) and Shen Jing沈璟 (1553-1610) were both outstanding playwrights in the
Ming, the two held diametrically opposite ideas about creation. The former was a true free spirit and “his intricate style was often a manifestation of the subtlety and minuteness of his thought.” (Dolby, pp. 92-93) The latter, on the other hand, was considered “a leading dramatic and musical theorist.” (Dolby, p. 99) Shen accused Tang of failing to match his prosody with the music and took the liberty of revising Tang’s masterpiece, The Peony Pavilion. Tang criticized Shen for making a big fuss over small things while totally neglecting the overall artistic impact of a work of art. Infuriated at Shen’s action and criticisms, Tang struck back: “To hell with it if this should crack everybody’s voice!” “正不妨拗折天下人嗓子”(See Zheng Peikai, p. 241.)
To sum up, the co-existing styles of Hui-diao 徽調, Han-diao 漢調, bangzi 梆子and Kunqu in the Anhui troupes laid down a solid foundation for the advent of Jingju. The strength of Jingju lay in its “comprehensiveness and ability to utilize heterogeneous styles of music and acting.”81 It eventually became the most popular genre of Xiqu because it had indeed integrated the essence of the yabu雅部 (the refined section) and the cream of the huabu 花部 (the flowery section). However, if we count from 1790 (the year where the first Anhui troupe entered Beijing for the celebration of Qianlong’s 80th birthday), it was still about 50 years before Jingju was truly established as an independent form.82
81Dolby, p. 168.
82See Beijing Arts Research Centre and Shanghai Arts Research Centre, eds., History of Peking Opera《中國京劇 史》(1999), vol. I, p. 76.