What is the difference between Cantonese Opera and Peking Opera? Which one has a longer history, and what do they have in common?

Cantonese opera is popular in Guangdong, Guangxi, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau. It is also performed in Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam, Burma, Cambodia, the Philippines, Indonesia, Australia, the United States, Canada, Mexico, Cuba, and Central and South America, where there are overseas Chinese living in Guangdong. Cantonese Opera is a major genre in the southern part of China, which is mainly composed of bangkas (known as xipi in Peking Opera) and erhuang, and is formed by combining Haiyan, Yiyang, Kunshan, and Bangkas that have flowed into Guangdong since the Ming and Qing Dynasties, as well as by absorbing the folk music of the Pearl River Delta.

The name of Cantonese opera appeared only in the Guangxu period of the Qing Dynasty, but its origin can be traced back to the middle of the Ming Dynasty more than four hundred years ago. In the 30 years before the founding of the PRC, Cantonese opera was basically divided into two major schools: the "Provincial and Hong Kong Big Classes" and the "Crossing the Mountain Classes" (or "Lok Heung Classes"). Li Wenmao, the "King of Fengzai", was one of the first artists in the history of world theater to become a leader of a peasant uprising. Kwong Sun-wah, the first head of the Cantonese Opera "Eight Harmonies Association", was not only a representative of the "Tongzhi Zhongxing", but also a famous martial arts veteran, who performed famous plays such as "Su Wu Shepherds Sheep", "Taibai and Fans" and "Li Mi's Love". At the turn of the late Qing Dynasty, it was a group of shining stars, famous actors and actresses, such as Qianli Kui, Xiao Li Xiang, Xiao Sheng Cong, Zhou Lingli, Li Xuefang, etc., all famous at home and abroad. Qianliju was known as the "King of Flower Dan", while Li Xuefang was known as "South Snow and North Plum" by Kang Youwei, alongside Mei Lanfang. In the 1930s, in the history of Cantonese opera, it was known as the era of "Xue and Ma's struggle for supremacy". Xue Juexian was close to the style of Peking Opera, and his performance skills were more comprehensive, and he was capable of performing in all aspects of life, but his performance was outstanding in the role of the youngest student, and his representative repertoire included four major tragedies, such as Hu Bu Gui. The representative plays include "Hu Bu Gui" and other four major tragedies. Ma Shi won in the role of a clown. In his group plays featuring the "lonely and cold" (miser), he exposed the ugliness of the feudal rich and capitalists to the fullest, in the style of Molière. Not only in Guangdong and Guangxi, Hong Kong, Macao and Southeast Asia, for the majority of the audience, in the United States for many years, but also very popular.

Peking Opera is one of the opera genres formed in Beijing, which has a history of nearly two hundred years. It is on the basis of Hui opera and Han opera, absorbed the Kunqu, Qinqiang and some other operatic genres of the merits and strengths of the gradual evolution and formation. Hui Opera was introduced to Beijing in 1790 (the 55th year of Qianlong of the Qing Dynasty), and the earliest Hui Opera troupe to enter the capital was the famous "Sanqing Troupe" from Anhui Province. Subsequently came to the capital and "four happy", "and spring", "spring Taiwan" classes, collectively known as the "four Huiban".

The official formation of Peking Opera is about Daoguang 20 years (1840) after the event, when the various singing version of Peking Opera has been initially available, Peking Opera's linguistic characteristics have been formed, in the role of the line of work has appeared new changes, has a number of Peking Opera repertoire with characteristics of Peking Opera, Peking Opera, the first generation of actors have also appeared: Yu Sheng San, Zhang Erkui, Cheng Changgeng is known as the old man! The first generation of Peking Opera actors had also appeared: Yu Shengsan, Zhang Erkui and Cheng Changgeng were known as the "Three Tripods", and there was also Lu Shengkui, a Peking Opera actor and writer. Cheng Changgeng is the representative figure of this period, he in the fusion of Han tune, Hui tune and absorbed the Kunqu to transform and improve than the same period of other Peking Opera actors made more efforts, the formation of the Peking Opera performance art contributed a lot to the development of Peking Opera played a great role in the development of influence on the later generations of Peking Opera.

The music of Peking Opera belongs to the board cavity system, and the main singing cavity has two systems: Erhuang and Xipi, which is why Peking Opera is also called "Pihuang". Peking Opera is also known as "Pihuang". Other commonly used cantons in Peking Opera include "Nan Bang", "Siping Tune", "Gao Bak Zi" and "Blowing Cavity". The traditional repertoire of Peking Opera is more than 1,000, and there are more than 300 to 400 repertoires in regular performances, of which a considerable number are written by Peking Opera artists and folk writers one after another, in addition to those from the Hui Opera, the Han Opera, the Kunqu Opera and the Qin Opera. Peking Opera specializes in political and military struggles with historical themes, and most of the stories are taken from historical dramas and novels. There are both big plays with whole books and a large number of folded plays, in addition to a number of serialized plays.

Peking Opera roles are strictly divided into seven lines of roles: Sheng, Dan, Jing, Mou, Chou, Wu Xing, and Pop (dragon set), which were later categorized as the four major roles of Sheng, Dan, Jing, and Chou.