Performers › Stage Performers
Xin Fengxia
Pingju actress raised in Tianjin who founded the Xin school, starred in Liu Qiao'er and Matchmaker of Flowers, and later turned to writing and painting
Backstage of a theatre troupe, an open trunk spills embroidered red and blue robes, one worked with a phoenix, beneath a jewelled headdress with long plumes; a mirror stand, a stool and a row of painted drums stand beside it, with a red curtain hanging at the right.
Also known as Born Yang Shumin · Childhood name Yang Xiaofeng
Xin Fengxia, born Yang Shumin and known as a child as Yang Xiaofeng, was born in Suzhou, Jiangsu, in 1927 and taken to Tianjin as a small girl. She learned Peking opera at six and switched to pingju at twelve, studying with Wang Xianfang, Deng Yanchen and Zhang Futang. Her singing style became known as the Xin school, and her best-known plays were Liu Qiao'er, Matchmaker of Flowers and Third Sister Yang Goes to Court, the first two also made into films. In 1951 she married the playwright Wu Zuguang. In later life she worked mainly as a writer and painter, publishing several volumes of memoirs and having studied painting with Qi Baishi. She died of a cerebral haemorrhage in Changzhou, Jiangsu, in April 1998.
Life and times
Dates 1927 CE–1998 CE