Shanghai Kunqu opera star to perform in Beijing

A poster of Zhang Jun's Kunqu opera show, "Blossom on a Spring Moonlit Night". The play will debut on Friday evening, March 17, 2017 in Beijing.[Photo: tartscenter.com]

Today, Zhang Jun, a dedicated opera singer, is adding a modern taste to this ancient art-form.

The artist is staging an opera, "Blossom on a Spring Moonlit Night" on Friday and Saturday evening in Beijing. 

Taking a 1,300-year-old poem from the Tang dynasty as inspiration, this upgraded production of the Kunqu opera is an epic tale of lovers that stretches across the worlds of men, ghosts and deities.

Zhang Jun was in Beijing recently promoting this romantic play. He humorously compares it to a modern K-pop drama.

"Blossoms on a Spring Moonlit Night is composed of five characters, each representing a unique personality of the Chinese people during that period of history. Little is known about the Tang-dynasty poet Zhang Ruoxu's life, but our script writer Luo Zhou has written a fantastic story about him, in which time-travel is central to the plot. The play actually has a lot in common with modern K-pop dramas."

With Zhang Jun leading a cast of the biggest names in both Kunqu and Peking opera, they capture the romance and elegance of Kunqu while introducing contemporary aesthetic values.

Zhang Jun was honored as a UNESCO Artist for Peace in 2011 and became the second Chinese artist to receive such an honor after actress Gong Li. In 2012, he fused New Age, Jazz, Electronica and Rock'n'Roll with traditional Kunqu Opera scores.

The upcoming play, is another typical Zhang Jun endeavor.

In addition to crafting more modern tunes, a story written for Kunqu opera music is always hard to create.

There are few new Kunqu opera scripts. According to Luo Zhou,the writer of the play, writing a story for Kunqu is very challenging because of the complicated verse structure and the rich cultural connotation attached to the art form.

In the end, Luo Zhou made a success of the play; something of which both he and Zhang Jun can feel proud.

In the play, Zhang Jun plays the lead role of the poet Zhang Ruoxu. During a promotional activity in Beijing, Zhang Jun was very excited in discussing the upcoming play.

"Zhang Ruoxu's first romantic encounter with his secret admirer, a beautiful girl Xinyi, took place in his hometown of Yangzhou. The 27-year old Zhang returned home after taking a lead in a civil service examination system in Imperial China. At the sight of 16-year old Xinyi on a moonlit night, he instantly fell in love with her. The story includes a total of three encounters between them.

Their second encounter is in Yangzhou, again on the sixteenth day of the first Chinese lunar month. Zhang Ruoxu remains 27 years old, but Xinyi is now 26. Their third and final encounter happens when Xinyi is 66 years and Zhang has still not aged. Zhang's persistency in his pursuit of love lasts for over half a century and this long process also enables him to explore the relationship between him and time and between him and the universe. Also to this point, the play interprets the two sentences in the old poem: "Who by the riverside first saw the moon arise? When did the moon first mirror a man by riverside? 

This play was performed in Shanghai in 2015. Opera fans were lining up at the Shanghai Grand Theater, and within just half an hour, the show's 300 posters and several thousand pre-sale tickets were reportedly all sold out.

Each time when Zhang Jun came onto the stage, audiences never hesitated to applause.

"The show was really great. He was quite devoted and the performance was just right."

In addition to appreciating melodic and refined opera, Zhang Jun also believes Kunqu is an effective way to memorize ancient poetry:

"In our learning of ancient Chinese prose, I would like to recommend my new method: to interpret the meaning of a poem via distinctive musical interpretation. Our goal is to better convey the essence, the core value of an ancient Chinese poem. About five or six years ago, I invented a new opera tune to ensure that the original words, sentences and Kunqu's melody remain there, but chose to accompany it with more modern music."

The 600-year-old art form was proclaimed as a Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO in 2001.

With Zhang Jun and his artists' long-term commitment to promoting cultural heritage, China's traditional art form is set to enjoy a bright future.