MUZI MUZIChinese Matrix

Chinese Dance Drama

Not a word spoken, every joy and sorrow shown

Introduction

Full-length stage drama told in dance, from Magic Lotus Lantern to today

Chinese dance drama is the full-length stage work that tells a complete story mainly through dance, with orchestra and scenery. Dove of Peace, staged in 1950 by Dai Ailian and colleagues, was the first dance drama of the People's Republic; in 1957 the Beijing Dance School choreographers Li Zhonglin and Huang Boshou turned the opera story of Splitting the Mountain to Save Mother into Magic Lotus Lantern, called the first full-length national dance drama of New China. Later came The Dagger Society, the Chinese-themed ballets The Red Detachment of Women and The White-Haired Girl, Rain of Flowers along the Silk Road (1979) drawn from the Dunhuang murals, and contemporary works such as Eternal Wave and A Poem of Green and Blue.

Timeline

1957 to present
1950 · EvolutionIn 1950 Dove of Peace, choreographed by a team of six including Dai Ailian, who also danced the lead, was staged in Beijing; using a ballet idiom, it was the People's Republic's first attempt at dance drama.1957 · OriginIn the summer of 1957 Magic Lotus Lantern, made by the Beijing Dance School choreographers Li Zhonglin and Huang Boshou from the opera story of Splitting the Mountain to Save Mother, was premiered by the dance troupe of the Central Experimental Opera Theatre, with Zhao Qing as the Third Holy Mother, martial movement coached by the Peking opera master Li Shaochun and music by Zhang Xiaohu; called the first full-length national dance drama of New China, it was filmed in colour in 1959.1964 · EvolutionIn 1964 the Central Ballet of China premiered the ballet The Red Detachment of Women at the Tianqiao Theatre in Beijing, and in the same year the Shanghai Dance School presented a short ballet The White-Haired Girl at the Shanghai Spring festival, later expanded to eight scenes: ballet was now used to tell Chinese stories.1979 · ImpactOn 1 October 1979 the Gansu Song and Dance Troupe's Rain of Flowers along the Silk Road premiered at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing; built around the Mogao mural figure of the celestial musician playing the pipa behind her back, it had been performed more than a thousand times at home and abroad by 1994.
  1. 1950EvolutionIn 1950 Dove of Peace, choreographed by a team of six including Dai Ailian, who also danced the lead, was staged in Beijing; using a ballet idiom, it was the People's Republic's first attempt at dance drama.
  2. 1957OriginIn the summer of 1957 Magic Lotus Lantern, made by the Beijing Dance School choreographers Li Zhonglin and Huang Boshou from the opera story of Splitting the Mountain to Save Mother, was premiered by the dance troupe of the Central Experimental Opera Theatre, with Zhao Qing as the Third Holy Mother, martial movement coached by the Peking opera master Li Shaochun and music by Zhang Xiaohu; called the first full-length national dance drama of New China, it was filmed in colour in 1959.
  3. 1964EvolutionIn 1964 the Central Ballet of China premiered the ballet The Red Detachment of Women at the Tianqiao Theatre in Beijing, and in the same year the Shanghai Dance School presented a short ballet The White-Haired Girl at the Shanghai Spring festival, later expanded to eight scenes: ballet was now used to tell Chinese stories.
  4. 1979ImpactOn 1 October 1979 the Gansu Song and Dance Troupe's Rain of Flowers along the Silk Road premiered at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing; built around the Mogao mural figure of the celestial musician playing the pipa behind her back, it had been performed more than a thousand times at home and abroad by 1994.