Chengwu County: Expressing Feelings Through Opera, Celebrating the Spring Festival Together

Recently, to strengthen the bond of friendship between Chinese and foreign people through culture and create a peaceful and joyful cultural atmosphere for the Spring Festival, Chengwu County joined hands with the Singapore Chinese Art Centre to launch the "Ode to Opera in the Lion City for the Spring Festival" cultural exchange activity in Singapore. Centered on the classic opera Sun Wukong Three Times Beats the White Bone Demon, the event featured a special Spring Festival opera performance, letting the charm of China's national intangible cultural heritage shine brightly in the Nanyang land during the Spring Festival.

The event was carefully planned and promoted by Guo Xuqian, the Overseas Cultural Communication Envoy of Chengwu County and founder of the Singapore Chinese Art Centre. At the opening of the event, Guo Xuqian affectionately introduced his hometown—Heze in Shandong Province, a world-renowned "City of Peonies" and "Hometown of Opera"—to the audience on site. His line, "Heze peonies stand unrivaled under heaven, their national beauty and celestial fragrance renowned across China; Heze opera has a time-honored history, with its singing, recitation, acting and acrobatics all embodying the essence of art", depicted a beautiful picture of his hometown where peonies bloom in splendor and opera melodies linger. It also laid a profound cultural foundation for the performance and instantly narrowed the emotional distance with the Singaporean audience.

Subsequently, performers from the Singapore Chinese Art Centre staged the classic monkey opera Sun Wukong Three Times Beats the White Bone Demon, which became the highlight of the performance. Amid the resounding gongs and drums, the Monkey King leaped and twirled nimbly, somersaulting through the air, and wielded the golden cudgel to draw vivid arcs. The performers perfectly portrayed Sun Wukong's wit, courage, liveliness and playfulness, captivating the audience who watched with bated breath. The audience cheered for the thrilling monkey opera fight scenes and laughed at the humorous recitations from time to time, immersing themselves in the unique charm of traditional Chinese monkey opera and experiencing the distinctive lingering charm of the integration of Eastern mythology and opera art.

After the performance, Guo Xuqian took the stage in person and explained the profound cultural connotations of opera behind the monkey opera in plain and easy-to-understand language. He talked about the symbolic meaning of the color of Sun Wukong's facial makeup and the golden cudgel, the stylized movements of monkey opera and the aesthetic pursuit of Chinese opera, and further narrated the inheritance and development of Heze's distinctive opera culture in detail. This allowed the audience to not only enjoy the spectacular performance, but also truly understand the profound essence of opera art. In the interactive session, the audience participated enthusiastically, imitating and learning simple opera arias one after another. Many also painted opera facial makeup by hand and tried on opera costumes, personally experiencing the unique charm of opera art.

Guo Xuqian stated that this Spring Festival opera cultural exchange activity is not only a display of art, but also a cultural bridge connecting China and Singapore. "We hope that through such activities, more Singaporean friends can feel the festive atmosphere of the Chinese Spring Festival, understand Heze's distinctive opera culture, and fall in love with China's intangible cultural heritage, so that the seeds of fine traditional Chinese culture can take root and germinate in the soil of Nanyang."

It is reported that the "Ode to Opera in the Lion City for the Spring Festival" cultural exchange activity is an important practice for Chengwu County to promote the international communication of Chinese culture. It is also a vivid measure to spread fine traditional Chinese culture and promote China's intangible cultural heritage and Heze's distinctive opera culture by relying on overseas communication platforms. In the future, Chengwu County will continue to deepen cooperation with the Singapore Chinese Art Centre, take opera as a distinctive cultural carrier, integrate more elements of Chinese opera culture and Heze opera, and carry out diverse overseas cultural exchange activities, allowing the fragrance of peonies and the melody of opera to spread far and wide across the world.