Types of Operatic Songs

Based on the differences in artistic characteristics, musical tunes, language, place of origin, popular regions, etc., it can be divided into many different types of operas, such as Yangzhou commentary, Shandong qinshu, comic opera, Henan Luzi, Jingyun drums, Suzhou playback, Sichuan Qingyin, HaoLaiBao, ZanHa, and Dabenqu.

Based on the characteristics of scripts, performance forms and musical compositions, they can be broadly categorized into five main types, such as commentary, comedy, quick-playing boards, drums, and rap-drums. Drums are popular in northern and northeastern China. It is generally accompanied by three strings and sung by actors playing drums. Some of them do not use musical instruments to accompany and only play drums to sing. It is a product of the Yellow River Basin and flourished at the end of the Qing Dynasty, developing and changing from folk songs and ditties. The earliest kind of northern drums is Plowshare Drum (i.e. Shandong Drum, Pear Blossom Drum), and its tunes are developed from a kind of folk songs combined with production and labor in the rural areas of Lubei, with strong local colors and simple and healthy local flavor. Why is the name of the drum? There are several different ways of saying this. One says that the drum was developed from the farmers' rice-planting songs, and the farmers sometimes beat the drum to lead and send songs. Rice-planting drums were originally very large, and then refer to the flat drums used by monks and Taoists, changing it into a small drum. It is said that, once upon a time, drums, specializing in large books, such as "Romance of the Three Kingdoms", "Sui and Tang dynasties" and so on, so the tube of large drums are called large drums, referred to as big drums.

There is also a saying that the drums are to solicit the audience, to bring people together, that is, playing the drums to tell the book, after being blackmailed into the big drum book. In short, no matter how to explain, the drums are from the Han folk up, there is no doubt. The country's two dozen kinds of drums, more than according to the name of the region. Such as West River drums, Shandong drums, Jingyun drums, Leiting drums, North Board drums, Jingdong drums, Fengtiao drums, as well as Pinggu, Tangshan, Nanyang, Shangdang, Northeast, Anhui, Hailuo, Hubei, Taiyuan, Guangxi, Changsha, Jiangxi, Jiaodong, Huainan drums and so on. According to the musical instruments, there are iron drums, wooden drums, plum blossom drums, pear blossom drums, Qingyin drums and so on. The big book is the middle and long book. It is performed with singing and talking. This type of music, such as the northern West River drums, southern commentary, is very popular with the farmers. From the point of view of the subject matter, the northern rap book is basically a traditional book, such as "Hujiazhuang", "Xuejiazhuang" and so on. The southern rap book has created a number of books reflecting real life, with great achievements. Like the commentary "true love", through the different attitudes of the two sisters to love, glorify the sister's noble and beautiful heart, exposing the sister's ugly and despicable soul, on how young people should deal with love, marriage, life and other issues, is very inspiring and educational. It was awarded the first prize for creation and performance at the National Opera Performance Observation Conference organized by the Ministry of Culture in 1982, and has been adapted into radio dramas, plays, and TV shows, which have become popular all over the country.