The White-Haired Girl

Introduction

Libretto by He Jingzhi and Ding Yi, music by Ma Ke and others, first staged in Yan'an in 1945

The White-Haired Girl is an opera created collectively at the Lu Xun Academy of Arts in Yan'an and first performed there in April 1945, and it is seen as an early landmark of Chinese national opera. Its story comes from the legend of the white-haired immortal told in the Shanxi, Chahar and Hebei border region, and its heroine is Xi'er, daughter of the poor tenant Yang Bailao. A first script by Shao Zinan was replaced by the libretto written out by He Jingzhi and Ding Yi, and the music was composed by Ma Ke, Zhang Lu, Qu Wei and others, with Xiang Yu, Li Huanzhi, Chen Zi and Liu Chi also taking part. The composers built the score on the Hebei folk song Little Cabbage and the tunes of Hebei bangzi, and the theme song The North Wind Blows comes from this opera. In the first run Xi'er was played in turn by Lin Bai and Wang Kun, and from 1947 Guo Lanying also sang the role. Later versions include a film of 1950, a Peking opera of 1958 and a ballet of 1964.

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