Yuan Xuefen

Yuan Xuefen was born in Sheng county, Zhejiang, in 1922 and entered the Sijichun training troupe in 1933 to learn the young female roles. From October 1942, at the Dalai Theatre in Shanghai, she led a reform of Yue opera: she hired writers and directors and replaced outline-based improvisation with full written scripts, and the result became known as 'new Yue opera'. In 1943 she and the musician Zhou Baocai created a new melody that became the basis of the Yuan school of singing. In 1946 she brought Xianglin's Wife, adapted from Lu Xun's story New Year's Sacrifice, to the Yue opera stage. In 1953 she starred with Fan Ruijuan in the Yue opera film The Butterfly Lovers. She died in Shanghai in February 2011.