This is Zhuge Liang's lyrics in the famous Peking Opera segment "The Empty City Strategy". It's also one of my favorite lyrics.

I don’t know when I started to have a strong interest in the performing arts of Peking Opera. I especially like the two arias of Zhuge Liang in The Empty City: "I'm Viewing the Mountain View from the Tower" and "I'm a Scattered Person in Wollongong". I like Peking Opera. In the eyes of my friends, most people think that I am very low, and some people think that I may be old. In fact, my love for opera may have originated from my childhood. When I was very young, I would watch and listen to operas on the backs of my grandparents. I also loved going to the backstage of the opera troupe to secretly watch people changing clothes and painting their faces.

We Zhouzhi have a tradition of singing opera. It can be said that the song can be sung from the Spring Festival to the busy summer season, and from the autumn harvest to the Spring Festival. In this way, every town and village performs operas almost every year. What's more, people with better economic conditions in some villages even compete with each other to sing rival operas. This can greatly satisfy the vast number of rural people who are relatively lacking in cultural life. It is no exaggeration to say that our Zhouzhi people’s love for opera is second to none in the land of Sanqin, and the operas produced by our Zhouzhi Theater Company are also one of the few among county-level theater groups in the country.

Based on this, I have been very interested in opera, an artistic form of singing, chanting, performing and playing, since I was a child. In fact, to put it bluntly, I went to the theater with my grandparents because there was always something delicious under the stage. The spicy and sour tofu puffs, the golden and sweet fried cakes, and the chewy cold cakes are all my favorites. I love going to the theater with my grandparents. It is often only at this time that they become very generous and generous, feeding and buying whatever they ask for. Because I understand that as long as I have needs, they will definitely meet them. Because only children whose mouths are stuffed with delicious food are the most obedient. As long as my mouth is satisfied, their mood for watching the show will also be satisfied by me.

I fell in love with opera unconsciously, and through my grandparents’ narrations, I learned many stories about opera. What agarwood saves the mother! Sanniang godson! Three drops of blood! What a shameless case! I was familiar with them all, and under their influence, I memorized some of the words in the opera. Who would have thought that these memories when I was young are often difficult to erase. The drama lyrics I memorized at that time actually played a big role in my future speaking and composition. The beautiful words that have been passed down for hundreds of years are also influencing me in a subtle way.

I remember reading in a book that opera is an art of "dancing with shackles". It has specific norms and routines, such as Qupai, Gongdiao, Pingqi, etc. Its creation is even more difficult than Tang poetry and Song lyrics. But even so, ancient Chinese composers still left behind many popular famous plays, making this art that flourished in the Song Dynasty, flourished in the Yuan Dynasty, and was widely popular in the Ming and Qing Dynasties, still loved by the broad masses of the people. The famous lines in many famous works include works with simple language and colorful articles such as "The Peony Pavilion"; they can be used for academic research and popularize common knowledge about opera among the public.

When I was still in elementary school, my father often communicated with Sun Weiwei, a very famous literary young man at that time. Sun Weiwei said that he has been watching operas with his grandfather since he was a child, so many words in his articles come from operas. Sun Weiwei was my childhood idol. After listening to his words, I silently developed a magical feeling about opera in my heart. I thought that as long as I could watch operas often, I would be able to write very good compositions.

By chance, under the influence of opera, both my thinking and literary quality have been improved to a certain extent. In fact, opera, as one of the important ways of cultivating rituals and music, played a positive role in ancient Chinese society. The ethics and morals in opera became the value criterion of ancient people's lives. The ethical and moral resources it contains, such as ideas such as loyalty, filial piety, integrity, and righteousness, can help change social customs, stabilize social order, and understand the cultural characteristics of the Chinese nation. Through this form of opera, rulers of past dynasties have subtly penetrated the enlightenment ideas into the hearts of the people.

Opera has the characteristics of entertaining, entertaining, and advocating good and punishing evil. Through the rendering of storylines, the shaping of characters, and the use of humorous language, it plays the role of persuading people to do good and transforming people into customs.

Did you know that opera is so powerful?

So, I secretly thought that over the years, I have not become bad, and I still think I still have some feelings. It is probably because I have been taught by opera, so I should be more grateful to opera.

Later I grew up and went to many places. I listened to various operas, including Peking Opera, Ping Opera, Yue Opera, Yu Opera, Huangmei Opera, etc. There are also different understandings of different types of opera. Gradually I feel that I still prefer Peking Opera! Because Peking Opera is more catchy, the pronunciation is more focused on Mandarin, and the melodious accent makes it less likely to make people feel hoarse. This is probably very different from Qin Opera. I personally think that Qin Opera expresses the roughness and heroism of Guanzhong men, while Peking Opera can exactly reflect the graceful and implicit literati feelings. I am not a literati, but I am far from the standard image of a man in Guanzhong. So I gradually fell in love with Peking Opera, listened to it often and started to learn Peking Opera. Although I have only learned two jokes in these years and can't sing them well enough, I still have some understanding and recognition of Peking Opera.

Now, almost every day when I am commuting in the car, I listen to the excerpt "I am viewing the mountain view from the tower" sung by Mr. Yu Kuizhi. And he is destined to hum along loudly, and likes to beat the beat with one hand, imitating his fans, and feels content. I figured that if I opened the car window, people outside would be suspicious of me like this. Could this person have a mental problem? But I just like it.

Mr. Yu Kuizhi's voice is rich, tactful, and mellow, and he creates a graceful image of Zhuge Liang strategizing on the city wall, and the inner softness on the outside and the inner strength are vivid and fascinating. Maybe most friends think that Peking Opera performance is too deep and difficult to get into, but I think if you listen to it a few times and get started, you will find that the art of Peking Opera is very charming. Once you listen to it, you will not want to give up. You will slow down. From not understanding to understanding, from understanding to liking, from liking to being obsessed.

In fact, Peking Opera is not vulgar, and liking opera is not low either. In fact, many young people now like Peking Opera, and there are many trendy elements in Peking Opera. Our operas include literature and martial arts, the singing is sweet music, the narration is skillful rapping, the fighting is wonderful martial arts, the costumes and facial makeup are exquisite fine arts, the lyrics are concise literature, the stories are history, and the stories are philosophy. It eliminates evil and promotes good, and is full of the spirit of the times and positive energy that will never go out of style. How can such a human treasure not be loved by people?

Friends, I am watching the mountain view from the tower! The scenery here is unique. Welcome you to enter the palace of Peking Opera and Chinese opera.

Don’t be distracted by your wild thoughts. Come, come, come, please come to the city and listen to me playing the piano...

Article | Yishou Dongmu