Pengpai News Reporter Liao Yang
After six years, the opera "Dream of Red Mansions" has returned to San Francisco Opera .
San Francisco On the evening of June 14th local time, the opera "Dream of Red Mansions", composed by Sheng Zongliang, co-written by Huang Zhelun and Sheng Zongliang, directed by Lai Shengchuan , Ye Jintian as the stage design and costume design, and Xu Fangyi was choreographed at the San Francisco Opera House.
In September 2016, this English opera premiered in the San Francisco Opera House, attracting widespread attention in the industry. Six years later, the old place of "Dream of Red Mansions" created by the Chinese "Dream Team" was revisited, bringing an opera feast from Chinese literary classics to the audience across the ocean.
This round of performances lasts from June 14th to July 3rd. At 14:00 local time on June 19 (5:00 Beijing time on June 20), the opera "Dream of Red Mansions" will be broadcast live on the official website of the San Francisco Opera House (US$25). You can watch the live broadcast within 48 hours after 10 a.m. the next day.
Opera "Dream of Red Mansions" returns to the San Francisco Opera
Opera "Dream of Red Mansions" performance. All the pictures in this article are from the San Francisco Opera House. Photography: Cory Weaver
teamed up to create dreams. The Chinese Dream Team built a production team
Condensing a 120-pass novel into a two-and-a-half-hour story is a huge challenge for the main creative team.
Huang Zhelun, who is good at telling stories on the Western stage and Sheng Zongliang, who loves "Dream of Red Mansions", sorted out "Dream of Red Mansions", which has many clues and complex relationships with characters, and reduced the characters in the original work to 7, and took the love of Bao, Dai and Chai as the main line, and used the rise and fall of the Jia family as the background.
"The sad and unfortunate love tragedy and family difficulties are attractive to everyone." When creating music, Sheng Zongliang incorporated many Chinese elements. For example, when he added Guqin in Baodao Bamboo Forest Poem, and when Baoyu was married, the melody of Shanghai Opera " Zizhu Tune " was incorporated, and the gongs and drums in traditional Peking Opera were used to set off the atmosphere, adding a touch of Chinese tenderness to the opera.
Ye Jintian also used a lot of Chinese elements on the stage, such as Yunjin, loom , and kite. He also used six translucent paintings to form a huge mobile device, showing the whole picture of the "Grand View Garden" and creating a stage that combines virtual and real. In terms of clothing design, he compared Baoyu and Daiyu to stone and water, and there are also many designs related to stone and water on the stage.
is not just a production team known as the "Dream Team" of Chinese people. On the night of the world premiere, the main actors in the play were also from Asia - Chinese tenor Shi Yijie plays Baoyu, Korean soprano Cao Qing plays Daiyu, and Japanese meteor 王球Robers plays Baochai .
This is the first time that "Dream of Red Mansions" has been adapted into an English opera. It is also the first work in the history of the San Francisco Opera House to use Chinese and English subtitles in its performance. It can be regarded as a cultural event hotly discussed in the city in San Francisco that year. Jay Xu, director of of the San Francisco Museum of Asian Art, believes that the performance of "Dream of Red Mansions" at the San Francisco Opera provides a window for the output of Chinese classical literature and Chinese culture, just as the plays of Shakespeare played in the promotion of British literature and culture.
In March 2017, the opera "Dream of Red Mansions" landed at the Hong Kong Art Festival and met with Asian audiences for the first time. Conductor Tang Muhai held the Hong Kong Orchestra, joined hands with seven Asian singers to reproduce the most beautiful world of Chinese literature on the Hong Kong stage. In September of the same year, the opera "Dream of Red Mansions" was unveiled in mainland China, and toured in Beijing, Changsha and Wuhan. Composer Sheng Zongliang served as the conductor and directed his opera works for the first time.
Zhang Meigui plays Daiyu
Jin Jianyu plays Baoyu
Wu Hongni plays Baochai
revisits the old place, Asian opera actors still sing the leading role
This time, the opera "Dream of Red Mansions" still retains the lineup of Asian actors starring, Korean tenor Jin Jianyu plays Baoyu, Chinese soprano Zhang Meigui plays Daiyu, Chinese mezzo Wu Hongni plays Baochai.
Asian actor starring, which was insisted by screenwriter Huang Zhelun. Director Lai Shengchuan also believes that these Asian actors will open everyone's eyes, "It's like a secret... The whole world doesn't know that there are so many talented Asian opera singers."
Hong Yiquan, the conductor of Singapore , was invited to take the San Francisco Opera Orchestra and choir. When he led the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra to hold a concert in February this year, Hong Yiquan expressed his yearning for conducting the opera "Dream of Red Mansions" to Shanghai reporters. When he was a child, he entered the world of "Dream of Red Mansions" through comic strips. Growing up in Singapore since he was a child, he is used to communicating with his mother in Chaozhou dialect . Now he is the artistic director of Sichuan Symphony Orchestra , and he is no stranger to Chinese culture.
"The true meaning of opera is to condense the complex situation and mood of a complex character into a note." Lai Shengchuan, who has been directing a stage play for a long time, once sighed after turning to opera that when orchestras, dancers, bands, and singers gather together, it feels very special and cannot be compared with other arts.
In order to prepare for this round of performance, Lai Shengchuan arrived in San Francisco early, and at the same time, he started rehearsing the "Director's Life Notes" of "Dream of Red Mansions" on Weibo .
This time, the crew has more rehearsal time and more technical synthesis time. Although the music has not been reduced by one point, the length of the play is about ten minutes less. "Where is the less? The connection between scenes and the details of the performance in the play can all be omitted, making the overall smoother."
Lai Shengchuan still needs to be familiar with the rhythm of the United States, but many complex regulations also make it difficult for him as a director to adapt.
The overall performance arts industry in the United States is subject to the constraints of the trade union. The rehearsal time cannot be determined by the director's idea, but must be decided by the trade union. In principle, 10 minutes of rehearsal must be rested for 80 minutes; if there is a dancer, 55 minutes of rest must be rested for 5 minutes; if there is an orchestra, it is another regulation... In addition, when the actor is resting, the director cannot talk to the actor unless the actor takes the initiative to find the director.
Editor in charge: Chen Shihuai
Proofreading: Zhang Yan
