Tibetan Opera

Tibetan Opera Today

With 600 years of history, Tibetan Opera known as the "living fossil of Tibet culture." Now, thanks to Beijing Olympics, the improvement of traffic and the development of tourism in Tibet make this unique Tibetan Opera begin to be dynamic again.

In the new theatre of Tibetan Opera performance group of Tibet Autonomous Region, 90 actors are busy rehearsing a large scale Tibetan song and dance performance-"Auspicious Olympics". After the primary selection of Beijing Olympic Organizing Committee, "Auspicious Olympics" came to the fore from the hundreds of performances, and it had been performed in the opening ceremony of Beijing Olympics with the other two dozens of cultural performances. Beijing Olympic Organizing Committee hopes that "Auspicious Olympics" can push the live performances to a climax within 3 minutes.

The head of Tibetan Opera group Dhondup Tsering said: "The entire group is working very hard practicing aria, spoken part, drumbeat and the particular 'blue mask' 'white mask' in Tibetan Opera. They had presented the unique national culture in the performance and show their joyful mood of Beijing Olympics."

The Origin of Tibetan Opera

Tibetan Opera was born in the early 15th century, mainly to sing and the combination of dance, performce, spoken part and skill. The content of the opera generally taken from the folk tales, historical biography and Buddhist stories. The actor singing in the field and we can hear his voice loud and clear from one kilometer away. Most of the characters wearing mask and there are also the female roles and the clown.

At present, Tibetan Opera has been listed in the national cultural heritage list. It is declaring to the UNESCO as the "Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity".

The Development of Tibetan Opera

In recent years, Chinese government allocated at least several million dollars for Tibetan Opera research and conservation every year. They established the Sour Milk Drinking Festival, the traditional Tibetan Opera performances in Tibetan New Year. Moreover, they organized the "National Symposium on Tibetan Development". Also, they plan to set up Tibetan Art Center which includes performance, data recording as well as an integrated research sites.

State Second Grade Scenarist Xiaoci Danduoji was one of the initial enrollment students of Tibetan Opera group after the establishment of Tibetan autonomous region in 1960. He said: "After the democratic reform of Tibet, Tibetan Opera walks from the square onto the stage, gradually developed from the folk drama team to formalize. From 1990s, Tibetan Opera walk into the world, the Tibetan Opera group has went to perform in Europe, United States, Japan and other places at the same time it cause a big stir. Now, the team of talents, repertoire creation, hardware etc. is in the best period of history."

Despite of the government-funded Tibetan Opera group, the other 160 civil Tibetan Opera performance teams have participated in some short arias; they inherit and promote Tibetan Opera art in another way. Likewise, Tibetan Opera group has been provided an overwhelming development space owing to the development of transportation and tourism.