Make up class
Today, I had my first make up lesson, the very first of my short 23 years life. My teach kept complaining about my make up and personally told me to join her make up class. Well, I told her that I can join on condition that i pay by installment. She say such things can be arranged so I had my first class today.
I arrived at CCK, Wanxin's house at 12.30pm. Yah, I know CCK is pretty far but I don't have a choice, do I? It was unbearably cold today. We chatted awhile and the others requested that we watch the vcd of our performance last Saturday and of Ramayana.
Ang asked which one we would like to see first. DLQ said," The one that we will get less scolding from!"
Hee hee... We are bound to get scolding anyway, it's a matter of time.
So we decided to see Xue Ding Shan first.
As usual, my performance sucks.
It was only acceptable in my point of view and I think I was very ugly. The others did fine except for Patrick. He didn't sing well and had no expression. Ang gave him a good lecture.
As I mentioned before, GZX isn't an artsy kind of opera. I accept it as a kind of comedy, a kind of play. I felt that this kind of plays are more popular, the audience likes to laugh. For us to survive, we need the audience and how many audience can stand those artsy form of opera?No wonder Qing Chun Mu Dan Ting does not want to perform in Singapore. A 3 days performance of one single show is not acceptable in our fast paced city.
I think GZX appeals to more youngsters too. We really have a lot of young people in our troupe compared to other opera forms. Youngsters can't stand artsy slow paced stuff. Yesterday, we had a new student who is a young girl, only 11 years old! And she is not new to GZX, she watched quite alot of GZX before. It's good, to attract such young people. I was really fascinated. I can't imagine an 11 years old girl interested in Liyuanxi or Kunqu. It is almost impossible. (I mean in Singapore)
Btw, I was rather happy with my performance in Ramayan. Although i did a funny little jump when there isn't supposed to be a jump there. I will temperorily forget about it. I am happy with that show! It is the first time I am happy with my performance. Or maybe second time, cuz I was rather happy with my Lian Hua Lao too... :D
Maybe you can't believe it but I actually designed my movements in Ramayan based on Kunqu. Hahaha... Sounds impossible right but it's true. I saw a rather nice performance of a cheerful wudan and I just copied her movements over.
For the Xue Jinlian, I tried to copy the Pekin Xun style movements. Xun style movements are especially good for cheerful little girls but I didn't do a good job as I was rather slack before the show. Abit lazy to go check out all the Xun style performance.
Phew... What a big digression! I was supposed to talk about my make up!
Back to the topic, My make up went on smoothly and now I had an idea what kind of make up Ang wants. Pratice makes perfect, I have got to practice more.
You must be thinking that I will definitely put up a photo of my finished make up but unfortunately, I am not going to. Cuz I think I still pretty much sucks. hee hee..
We ended our make up class at 7:30pm! Can you imagine??? I think we were abit distracted, watching the VCDs. After that, we went down to the kopitiam at around 8pm for dinner. Gosh.. I didn't have lunch today.
I can't believe we sat at the kopitiam talking and talking until 11pm!! Lots of confidential stuff and sensitive topics. Hee hee.. you know la..
*yawnz* tired liaoz... going to sleep~ ZZZZzzzzz....
I arrived at CCK, Wanxin's house at 12.30pm. Yah, I know CCK is pretty far but I don't have a choice, do I? It was unbearably cold today. We chatted awhile and the others requested that we watch the vcd of our performance last Saturday and of Ramayana.
Ang asked which one we would like to see first. DLQ said," The one that we will get less scolding from!"
Hee hee... We are bound to get scolding anyway, it's a matter of time.
So we decided to see Xue Ding Shan first.
As usual, my performance sucks.
It was only acceptable in my point of view and I think I was very ugly. The others did fine except for Patrick. He didn't sing well and had no expression. Ang gave him a good lecture.
As I mentioned before, GZX isn't an artsy kind of opera. I accept it as a kind of comedy, a kind of play. I felt that this kind of plays are more popular, the audience likes to laugh. For us to survive, we need the audience and how many audience can stand those artsy form of opera?No wonder Qing Chun Mu Dan Ting does not want to perform in Singapore. A 3 days performance of one single show is not acceptable in our fast paced city.
I think GZX appeals to more youngsters too. We really have a lot of young people in our troupe compared to other opera forms. Youngsters can't stand artsy slow paced stuff. Yesterday, we had a new student who is a young girl, only 11 years old! And she is not new to GZX, she watched quite alot of GZX before. It's good, to attract such young people. I was really fascinated. I can't imagine an 11 years old girl interested in Liyuanxi or Kunqu. It is almost impossible. (I mean in Singapore)
Btw, I was rather happy with my performance in Ramayan. Although i did a funny little jump when there isn't supposed to be a jump there. I will temperorily forget about it. I am happy with that show! It is the first time I am happy with my performance. Or maybe second time, cuz I was rather happy with my Lian Hua Lao too... :D
Maybe you can't believe it but I actually designed my movements in Ramayan based on Kunqu. Hahaha... Sounds impossible right but it's true. I saw a rather nice performance of a cheerful wudan and I just copied her movements over.
For the Xue Jinlian, I tried to copy the Pekin Xun style movements. Xun style movements are especially good for cheerful little girls but I didn't do a good job as I was rather slack before the show. Abit lazy to go check out all the Xun style performance.
Phew... What a big digression! I was supposed to talk about my make up!
Back to the topic, My make up went on smoothly and now I had an idea what kind of make up Ang wants. Pratice makes perfect, I have got to practice more.
You must be thinking that I will definitely put up a photo of my finished make up but unfortunately, I am not going to. Cuz I think I still pretty much sucks. hee hee..
We ended our make up class at 7:30pm! Can you imagine??? I think we were abit distracted, watching the VCDs. After that, we went down to the kopitiam at around 8pm for dinner. Gosh.. I didn't have lunch today.
I can't believe we sat at the kopitiam talking and talking until 11pm!! Lots of confidential stuff and sensitive topics. Hee hee.. you know la..
*yawnz* tired liaoz... going to sleep~ ZZZZzzzzz....
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Comments
I am glad that your troupe have a lot of young people. It speaks well for the future of GZX.
I hope that other chinese forms also flourish in Singapore.
I think Cantonese opera is one of the major opera in Singapore. It has far more audience than Gezaixi. I am also surprised that you understood my shortform, GZX. hee hee.
Miko, I suppose Amai is your good friend and in the same opera troupe. No??
I suggest you put up an announcement or a poster in your blog about any future performance by your troupe.
Amai is my friend but she is not in the same troupe as me.I am doing Gezaixi and Liyuanxi while she is doing XiangJu.
Do you know other opera fanatics blog? I would like to read up and perhaps know them personally.
Anyway, the correct pronunciation for "GZX" should be Ge Zi Xi and not Ge Zai Xi, because "Zai" is usually meant as a degratory word, like "Gou3 Zai3 Dui4" and "Tu4 Zai3 Zi5", etc.. hee...
So many ppl used to say Ge zai xi liao. I think if suddenly change over, also not used to it. I think even in taiwan, they pronounced it as ge zai xi right.
Some questions:
1. Are GZX and Liyuanxi very similar or are they different types of operas?
2. Is XiangJu performed in mandarin?
3. Where did you get the pictures of the cute little artistes in your 'Kiddy opera again!' post?
1. GZX and liyuanxi are very different. liyuanxi's language is based on Quanzhou dialect and the tunes they sing is based on Nanyin, but both belongs to the Fujian province.
2. XiangJu is the twin sister of GZX. It is performed in Hokkien too.
3. Those pics are from CCTV.com, under 'shao er' category. You can buy the Xiao Mei Hua VCDs to see the performance of these kids. They are really cute and some are really good too!!!
I hope to watch your performance one day.