Bowl Bowl Cavity

Wan Wan Opera, originally was the popular shadow play tune-pattern in the east of Guanzhong region in Shaanxi. Afterward it spread to He'nan and Shanxi.Wan Wan Opera was mature in the beginning of Qing Dynasty. Musically, different from Shaanxi Opera's focus on Banhu,Wan Wan Opera with its thick regional feature shows its melody by knocking the copper bowl. The way it rhymes is seldom. The history of using shadow play in Wan Wan Opera dated back to even before Han Dynasty. Its selected material, vivid characters endowed Shadow Play with vitality. Developed after coming into being of the People's Republic of China, it was moved to stage and performed by actors. Successively two relevant troupes were established--Meiwan troupe of Shaanxi Opera Research Institute and Dali Wan Wan Opera troupe. The latter was cancelled later but the former still keeps on improving Wan Wan Opera.Different from the city troupes, folk Wan Wan Opera still keeps its form of shadow play. Normally five or six people are enough for the whole performance. For different reasons, experienced entertainers become less and less. Plus no successors and fewer performances, Wan Wan Opera is dying at an extraordinary speed. It's urgent to save it now. A remarkable phenomenon is that though shadow play was out in the cold in mainland, it is popular abroad. A handful of famous entertainers and troupes are often invited to perform abroad. Difficult to find successor in mainland, they recruited foreign prentices. Some foreign experts try to transform our history documents into their own academic results by purchasing our cultural inheritance with loads of money. Therefore, pilot combing of the development of Wan Wan Opera, sorting and studying the existing performance material, analyzing the performance and living situation of folk troupes is the focus of this dissertation.This dissertation is divided into four chapters. Chapter 1 concerns the combing and dividing of Wan Wan Opera's headstream, which hasn't been mentioned in any relevant papers before. The writer hopes it can found the basis for further research in future. Chapter 2 studies the list of plays of Wan Wan Opera. After respectively discussing folding dramas and grand dramas, it gives detail evaluation combining different performing circumstance. Chapter 3 is the study about performing arts of Wan Wan Opera - from the particularity shown in plastic arts, producing technics, performance appearances and music to draw rudimentary conclusion on the experience of moving Wan Wan Opera to theatre. The last chapter sorts the interviews with entertainers. The purpose is to objectively record the existence of primitive opera and to prepare material for protecting this kind of art from dying.The research on Wan Wan Opera not only refracts the development path of local operas, but also provides an individual case for small operas. Meanwhile, it means a lot for ceaseless opera innovation.