On Saturday April 12th I attended a performance by the Tianjin Peking Opera Company. The show comprised of selections from three different operas; A Dragon Flirts with a Phoenix, Wu Song Kills the Tiger, and The Ghost of the Black Pot. The show opened with A Dragon Flirts with a Phoenix. The synopsis of this selection is the Chinese Emperor, Zhengde of the Ming dynasty, is travelling and stops for rest at an inn where he meets Phoenix, the innkeeper. While there he tries everything in his power to seduce the young woman. The second selection was Wu Song Kills the Tiger. This selection is about an outlaw hero, Wu Song, who is travelling (I’m sensing a theme here) and comes across an inn where he stops for a drink. While at the inn he has a large amount of wine, against the advice of the innkeeper, and then sets out to retrieve money to pay his tab. There have been many reports of a tiger that is terrorizing the area. Upon setting out Wu Song comes across this tiger and is force to fight it, inebriated. Eventually, after an impressive fight scene between the two, Wu Song kills the tiger. (Who would have guessed) The third selection was The Ghost of the Black Pot. This selection recounts how a kiln owner, Big Zhao, and his wife murder a merchant in order to steal his money. The merchant’s body is then cremated and made into a black pot by his murderers. Eventually after years of living in luxury an old man name Zhang Biegu comes to collect money from Big Zhao. Instead of paying him in actual money Big Zhao gives him the pot with the merchants soul trapped in it. The merchants soul appears of stage and asks for help getting revenge on Big Zhao. That’s where the selection ended.. no resolution.
Going into this I was not expecting to enjoy it very much; eastern music tends to be hard on the ears of a western listener. However, I was very pleasantly surprised, the music was not too hard to listen to and the stories made the experience a lot of fun. The first two selections were very comical with Phoenix constantly denying the advances of the emperor and Wu Song and the innkeeper drinking so much they could barely stand. Given the opportunity I would definitely attend a Peking opera again. It was a lot of fun and I think a lot of people would enjoy it.
mus115: opera 