On May 7, 1959, Zhang Aizhen was born into a peasant family in Guanzhuang Village, Hexi Town, Gaoping City. Her parents named her Aizhen out of their cherishment for their daughter. On this day, she started the drama of her life. Zhang Aizhen's father, Zhang Donglin, is an out-and-out fan of Shangdang Bangzi. In the amateur theater troupe in his hometown, his father was the backbone of the comprehensive artistic business. Little Aizhen and her brother Feng Laisheng have been immersed in this amateur theater troupe since they were young. Watching theater with their father became the greatest joy of their childhood. His elder brother Feng Laisheng was a music lover. Once, he was playing the huqin at home and saw Aizhen and several children of the same age playing in the yard. Unintentionally, he called these children into his home and asked them each to sing an agricultural song. Dazhai's songs. Suddenly I discovered that Zhang Aizhen had accurate pitch and a loud voice, and could sing along with the accompaniment of the Huqin. This unexpected discovery made Feng Laisheng extremely pleasantly surprised. Although Aizhen was only 6 or 7 years old at the time, because she did not understand the meaning of the lyrics and could not pronounce clearly, she sang "Liang Bao Jian" instead of "Two Cents", but with the intuition of a music lover, he felt that her sister had the musical talent With talent and a good voice, he will definitely be an opera singer in the future. Zhang Aizhen was born with a love for singing. At that time, the loudspeakers in the village often played "The clear water comes, the sky is blue and clear..." and "The mountains of Jiaocheng come, the water of Jiaocheng..." sung by Guo Lanying. She is a loyal listener of these songs. Once you learn how to sing, you can sing sweetly. When people in the village enjoy the cool weather in the summer, they like to ask her to sing a few songs. In winter, when they get together to have a prosperous time, they also let her sing a few songs. At this time, little Aizhen, who is usually taciturn, feels happy in her heart, just like a little singer. However, something unexpected happened and she lost her mother when she was 9 years old. Later, her brother got married and left to live alone, leaving only her father and her in the family. In order to prevent her father from doing more housework after work, she used her tender shoulders to shoulder the burden of housework left by her mother. Her childhood was spent going to school, cooking, feeding pigs, washing clothes, and cleaning. To this day, every time she thinks about those days, she will say with emotion that probably since her mother passed away, her childhood life has ended and her life has come to an end. In 1972, the Gaoping County Youth Literature and Art Training Class enrolled students. Under her brother's persuasion, she signed up to take the exam. Wearing the plastic-soled shoes she bought for the first time in her life, she walked on the asphalt road in the city. Her feet made a crisp sound of "bah, bah". She was so excited... She scored points for singing and speaking in the exam. The main test of singing is to test high notes, which is her strength, so she is naturally not afraid. Daobai was her weak point. The Daobai exam at that time required candidates to say two sentences. One was "Our literature and art all serve the people." To put it bluntly, "I'm so speechless (ba'r)." Due to her Gaoping accent, there is no distinction between front nasal sounds and back nasal sounds, apical sounds and back tongue sounds, and a mouth-to-mouth call and a full-teeth call. Erhuayin, this is really embarrassing for this little girl who has been speaking Gaoping dialect for thirteen years. In order to speak as standard as possible, she would circle the places where she often mispronounced them, look them up in the dictionary, mark them with pinyin, and try to read them. When it came time for the exam, everyone else said these two sentences in a Gaoping accent: "Our literature (xie) and art all serve the people." and "I wasted my words (ba)er (er)." Only she spoke more standardly. After some hard work, she was admitted at the age of 13, and her bitter but sweet career in the arts began. From then on, there was a tall and thin girl in Dinglin Temple. She got up in a hurry before the morning sun came out, and when the night fell, she kicked her legs, did splits, lowered her waist, and pulled up her top... The most troublesome thing for her was pulling up her top. She always This action cannot be completed. The teacher was not accommodating at all and forced her to practice. With the teacher's insistence, she finally completed this movement. However, in a short period of time, she fell to the ground as she tilted and practiced this movement with her. Other students also fell down one after another "thump, thump". Newborn calves are not afraid of tigers. When I was still in the training class, I once performed "Du Juanshan" in a rural area. The audience came in one after another, but the actor who played Ke Xiang suddenly fell ill and could not perform. She volunteered and volunteered. Ke Xiang came on stage with his hands in shackles, and sang very passionately, "Get away from this..." While singing and making movements, due to excessive force, the shackles were thrown over his head and behind him. In desperation, He quickly raised his feet, and the shackles behind him returned to the front. She spoke and demonstrated, and laughter filled the room. "The first play I rehearsed in the troupe was the modern drama "Butterfly Love Flower", in which I played Yang Kaihui.

In order to play this role well, I made a special trip to Beijing to watch and study the Peking Opera "Butterfly Love Flower" starring Li Weikang. Her superb performance and beautiful singing greatly opened my artistic horizons. After returning, I combined the characteristics of Shangdang Bangzi and worked hard on the character's identity and temperament, and finally made the performance of this character a success. It caused quite a stir in Gaoping at that time and performed more than 20 times in a row. The leaders of the cultural department in the southeastern Shanxi region personally led the members of the three troupes and one school in the region to Gaoping to watch the performance, and the drama school copied the entire play. "In 1981, the "die love flower" in life came to fruition. This year, she was no longer alone, she got married. Her husband Zhang Jianguo and she were classmates in the training class. They had been classmates for 4 years and had the same goals. Zhang Jianguo is also the son of a farmer. He is loyal, simple and upright. He originally studied acting and later switched to music. After graduating from a training class in the same year as her, he was assigned to serve as a band player in the Gaoping People's Theater. In 1983, his son was born. Looking at her son, she experienced the indescribable joy of a mother; but the arrival of her son also added many new difficulties to the actor's life. As an adult, she performed outside the home, and her child just turned one month old. She had to take her son to perform in the countryside. Once, she had a high fever when she was performing in the countryside with the Gaoping Youth League. She was still nursing her 5-month-old son at the time. Even the doctor said she could not participate in the performance that night, but later, she insisted on letting her go. The doctor tried to lower her body temperature to 38 degrees to ensure that she could perform for the audience. However, the 5-month-old child was sent to the hospital overnight because she had a fever and had no milk. At that time, the audience was watching her performance. , but the child was crying from hunger. After returning to Gaoping and being hospitalized, the grandma walked back and forth for more than 5 miles with the child in her arms, but she still couldn't get enough milk... Zhang Aizhen is also a good wife and loving mother. She could only do this for the troupe and her career. Now, in order to better take care of her two children, her husband Zhang Jianguo left the troupe and became a teacher at a vocational and technical college. This also relieved Zhang Aizhen's burden of performing. She no longer has to worry about her children; when she is relaxing at home, she can also sing, practice and ponder her lines quietly. At this time, he is also her consultant and first audience. I don’t know who once told me that "a perfect family is a successful life." half of. "It can be said that Zhang Aizhen's perfect family has made her career successful.

"In 1978, I performed the first traditional play in my life, "Yingtai Resists Marriage", and I played Zhu Yingtai. This play does not exist in the traditional Shangdang Bangzi opera. It was transplanted and adapted by the Shangdang Bangzi Theater Troupe of Gaoping County based on the Sichuan Opera "The Story of the Willow Shade". This is the first traditional play to be resumed by Shangdang Bangzi after the ban on traditional plays during the Cultural Revolution. And in just one month, the play was put on the stage. That year, I was only 19 years old. ”

During the training class, traditional opera was still out of bounds, so she did not systematically learn how to perform traditional opera. In order to perform this traditional opera well, she used Qingyi’s fingers, shoes, and Starting from walking and running around, she humbly learned every move from the old artists. She also went to Taiyuan at her own expense to learn Shui Sleeve Kungfu from Shanxi opera performing artists Tian Guilan and Xiao Guiye. In a short period of time, she mastered the basic skills of Shangdang opera. Bangzi's performance is relatively rough and bold, pursuing women

She wants thick lines, big outlines, strong and bright, but her role as Zhu Yingtai in "Yingtai Resists Marriage" has a different charm, focusing on carving. Therefore, after the performance of "Yingtai Resistance to Marriage", the audience and leaders responded well to her portrayal of Zhu Yingtai. This is an encouragement to her and a good start for learning more. She deeply absorbed the beautiful singing style of Shangdang Bangzi, and began to learn the singing method of Wu Wanzhi, a famous actor of Shangdang Bangzi. She found the records recorded by her teacher before the Cultural Revolution, listened to them carefully, and studied them repeatedly. In order to get the true version, she paid a visit and became her teacher. Teacher Wu Wanzhi warmly accepted her and accepted her as her apprentice before she left. Teacher Wu also gave her a suit of fabric and a pair of pants as a gift for the first meeting between master and apprentice. Teacher Wu not only taught her singing, but also cared for her in life. Therefore, Zhang Aizhen said: "We have a master-disciple relationship. It's about mother-daughter love. "In future rehearsals, she would ask Teacher Wu for advice, especially the rehearsal of "Qin Xianglian". Teacher Wu gave her a lot of guidance. When Teacher Wu passed away from illness, she was deeply saddened: "My dear teacher, I cried loudly. The cranes crowed, and every sentence commemorated the benevolence of the great figures. ”

“Shangdang Bangzi is a traditional art, but it also needs innovation.

Actors not only have to sing opera, but also have to sing emotion. "Killing the Wife" is a play released after reforming the Shangdang Bangzi singing style. My experience with the performance of "Killing Wife" is that the first thing is to distinguish the paragraph levels; the second thing is to be lyrical and emotional; the third thing is to be relaxed and relaxed, natural and smooth, and done in one go. ”

In 1984, Zhang Aizhen started acting in the Shangdang Bangzi Troupe in Gaoping County. The scripts at that time were different from those of today. In 1986, she was transferred to the Shangdang Bangzi Youth Troupe in Jincheng City and re-established her acting career. After editing the play, Wang Yulian is still played by Zhang Aizhen, and Wu Han is played by Zhang Baoping. The difference is that Wu Han originally dressed as Wu Sheng, while Zhang Baoping changed his appearance as Xu Sheng (Wu Han changed his appearance to red face, Shangdang Bangzi Formerly known as Hongsheng), Zhang Aizhen and Zhang Baoping both won gold medals for starring roles in the Shanxi Four Bangzi Youth Troupes this year, and the performance was a great success. "Especially the last big singing scene of "Killing the Wife". The audience is shocked and deeply attracted every time. The scene at that time was that the auditorium was quiet, people were concentrating, and many people had tears in their eyes and forgot to wipe them..." (——Wu Baomingyu, former director of Jincheng Shangdang Drama Theater and national first-class composer) End of the performance Later, Shangdang Opera and "Killing the Wife" caused a great stir in the provincial capital and received many comments and responses. It was said to be "a great example of inheritance of tradition and reform and innovation". He said, "After watching the play, people's minds were shocked and their ears and ears were refreshed." Many people said, "It's really fun. It really makes our hometown people who work in other places feel proud." "Our actors are no worse than others" and so on. After that, "Killing the Wife" received high praise at the National Vocal Academic Symposium, filming in Northeast China, and performing in Beijing. So far, this play is often performed. It is roughly estimated that "Killing Wife" has been performed for more than 1,000 times. In 1991, when Zhang Aizhen went to Beijing to participate in the Plum Blossom Award competition, "Killing Wife" was included in the competition, but Wu Han was replaced by Guo Xiaoming. Guo Xiaoming is a long-term stage partner. When they performed in Beijing, their perfect combination of performances conquered the Beijing audience. Zhang Aizhen won the "Plum Blossom Award" in the history of Shangdang Bangzi Opera. She and Wu Guohua, who won the "Plum Blossom Award" in the same year, were the first to win the National Art Award. In 1995, the song "The Plum Tree in front of the Window is My Friend" sung by Zhang Aizhen won the 3rd China Record Award. Golden Disc Award. This is one of the highest awards in Chinese art. The first award was won by the art master Ding Guoxian. The second award was not won by Zhang Aizhen and Wang Aiai. Communication with theater fans is the criterion for evaluation. Zhang Aizhen attaches great importance to emotional communication with the audience every time she performs. After each performance, she will often have different feelings and inspirations from both familiar and unfamiliar audiences. He came backstage to sing and talk with her. Once, during a performance of "Tang Taizong's Spring Outing" in the countryside, Zheng Qingxiao sang "It turns out to be the cold wind rustling the door knocker." When she sang this, the audience said, "Stop singing." "She stopped, not knowing what was going on. The audience said: "Just sing this line, we still want to hear this line. She sang it again, and the audience shouted again, saying, "I don't want the band to accompany me, but I want to listen to her singing a cappella." "Inspired by this singing line, she used it in the singing line of "Knocker" in "Killing Wife". It was the accumulation of this bit by bit that led to her future achievements.

"If "Killing My Wife" has greatly improved my singing art; then, "Letters from Two Places" has given me a deeper understanding and understanding of the performing arts, and a further understanding of artistic rules and expressions. I have a deep understanding of the comprehensive performance characteristics of various categories of opera art, as well as the positioning and role performance of actors in all aspects of stage art. "

If an actor wants to portray a character well, he must first understand the character. "Letters from Two Places" is a reinterpretation of the love story of Sima Xiangru and Zhuo Wenjun. She first invited the famous Peking Opera director Ma Ke to come In the acting class, after Ma Ke elaborated on the importance of the character's "movement", she carefully honed the character of Zhuo Wenjun she played. In order to accurately grasp her body language, she studied the famous Party master Bai Fushu. The teacher learned to practice calligraphy and learned to play the guzheng from the band players... To successfully create an opera character, physical language alone is not enough, you also need to have a singing voice that suits the character's personality.

Zhang Aizhen handled this aspect very well. Once, when the play reached the point where Zhuo Wenjun was deeply in love and finally received Sima Xiangru's family letter, she handled it very carefully and accurately. I was very excited when I got this letter, but when I opened it, I found that there were only 11 numbers on it, "1234567, 7890". What does this mean? She was thinking, and the audience in the audience was also very selfless. Seeing that she had not thought about it, they shouted hurriedly: "I still don't understand, it's two wives!" The theater fans around them were dissatisfied with her. There was a "shhhhhh" sound. In fact, the singing characteristics of Shangdang Bangzi are not only high-pitched and exciting, not masculine, but also beautiful, tactful and feminine. If in a play there is both masculinity and femininity, both high pitch and euphemism, it will be a real audio-visual enjoyment.

“An actor cannot stop after a little success, and cannot be satisfied just because he has become famous in this profession. Only by learning from the singing styles of other professions can your singing art be fuller.”< /p>

"Killing the Wife" was a leap for her to hit the peak of Shangdang Bangzi singing art, and "Letters from Two Places" was another important self-transcendence for her to perfect her performing arts. Faced with these achievements, she did not Not satisfied, but always working hard to tap your potential. In "The Female General of the Yang Family", she played Mu Guiying, adding her own sword and horse skills. She said that Pai Dao Ma Dan Opera is to increase and open up her own Qingyi and Xiaodan opera paths. In "Sisters Get Married", she changed from her usual roles of dignified and generous positive characters, and instead played the negative character Zhang Suhua, who dislikes poverty and loves wealth. In "Zhan Hua Tang", she played the role of Song Qiaolian, a loyal and upright daughter who was framed by a traitor. She also sang the role of Zhang Jinxiang, the murderer of Song Qiaolian's father. Shangdang Bangzi Musical "There Was a She Saihua in Saibei", this play condenses all the Yang family opera scripts, from "Seven Star Temple" to "Ci Chao", she plays She Saihua, from Xiaodan, Daomadan to Qingyi, Lao Dan. In life, she has many professions. She has been the leader of a theater troupe, a teacher, a wife and a mother, but these many professions have not affected her acting at all.

"Today, Zhang Aizhen is a representative figure of Shangdang Bangzi performing arts. Her "Aizhen accent" is widely circulated, and she has made significant contributions to Shangdang Bangzi.

< p> "When I was very young, I listened to Dang Bangzi; when I was a little older, I learned Dang Bangzi; now, I sing Dang Bangzi. Shangdang Bangzi is my lifelong favorite, and I will use my whole life to perform Shangdang Bangzi. She saw the current situation of Shangdang Bangzi: "The development of opera culture in our city is not optimistic. The Lingchuan County and Qinshui County troupes have been disbanded, and the Zezhou County troupe no longer performs in the countryside." There are five reasons: there are few leading actors in the troupe; the income of actors and actresses is low; social security is not in place; there is no money and new plays cannot be arranged; the audience is dissatisfied with the same old plays. ”

“In order to further sublimate the opera culture in our city and reverse the current trough situation, I personally have a few suggestions: Let some famous actors be sent to various counties to support them for 1 to 2 years. The county-level theater troupe trains a group of young actors for each county; the young actors from the city troupe are allowed to take the lead in breaking into the market and get full display and training; the drama theater organizes a group of writers to compile and innovate a batch of old Shangdang Bangzi plays to provide The old plays are put on new clothes, allowing more young audiences to enter the theater to watch and appreciate the wonderful and melodious art of Shangdang Bangzi; in order to prevent Shangdang Bangzi from becoming a 'sunset art' or a 'twilight art' Please ask the city to open a Shangdang Bangzi Opera School as soon as possible, recruit students for free, use three years to cultivate a group of Shangdang Bangzi talents, and produce a few "plum blossoms"; transfer a group of college graduates to enrich the Cultural and artistic teams to solve their work, life and treatment issues. At the same time, we must cultivate our own audience, especially young audiences. "After graduating from the "Youth Training Class", Zhang Aizhen embarked on her first social stop - Gaoping County People's Theater, as an actor. Soon, the troupe was preparing to perform the Peking Opera "Die Lian Hua". Due to her good voice condition, Zhang Aizhen was in Among the young actors who had no career, she was chosen as the heroine in the play, playing the role of Yang Kaihui.

Facing this important role, Zhang Aizhen was both happy and worried. In order to better control this character, Zhang Aizhen specially worked. I went to Beijing and watched the performance of the famous Peking Opera actor Li Weikang in "Butterfly Love Flower". From his singing to his body movements, gestures, laughter and curses, Zhang Aizhen saw everything in his eyes and remembered it in his heart.

After returning to the group, Zhang Aizhen consulted more historical information about Yang Kaihui to further deepen her understanding of the character. Starting from the inner feelings, combined with the characteristics of Shangdang Bangzi, she worked hard on the singing performance, and finally made this character appear fully fleshed out. in front of an audience. The success of "Butterfly Love Flower" also marked the official beginning of Zhang Aizhen's stage career. On the road of art, Zhang Aizhen is always looking for various ways to continuously improve her skills. In 1979, Zhang Aizhen became a teacher of Dang Bangzi performing artist Wu Wanzhi. Teacher Wu's exquisite singing and performance gave Zhang Aizhen great help, and at the same time, Zhang Aizhen continued to improve her artistic level.

With the continuous accumulation of stage experience, Zhang Aizhen's artistic attainments are also constantly improving. Many plays starring her have been widely praised in various performances, and her performances have gradually been recognized and affim. Going to Beijing to compete for the "Plum Blossom Award" has become her goal in pursuing art.

At this time, Zhang Aizhen has become the leader of the second performance troupe of Jincheng Shangdang Theater. Her idea has received strong support from the cultural department, the theater and the troupe. In 1991, Zhang Aizhen embarked on a journey to Beijing to compete for the "Plum Blossom Award" with her carefully arranged "Killing Wife" and "Letter from Two Places". Zhang Aizhen's gentle and unique singing voice and her perfect stage performance with her old partner Guo Xiaoming really conquered the audience in the capital. The performance of Shangdang Bangzi achieved unprecedented success. Zhang Aizhen got her wish and won the "Plum Blossom Award" with excellent results in second place. "Aizhen Tune" suddenly became the focus of attention in the opera industry. Media across the country began to cover it with overwhelming coverage. Zhang Aizhen succeeded. During her many years of opera career, Zhang Aizhen has always traveled between rural and urban stages. Her busy work has left her with no time to take care of her family and children. For this famous actress, her family has given her the most understanding and support. Zhang Aizhen's lover, Zhang Jianguo, was originally an actor in the same theater troupe with her. Later, he switched to an administrative position, which gave him more time to take care of Aizhen and her children. Zhang Jianguo is a very attentive husband. He will classify all the art information about Zhang Aizhen and sort it out very carefully.

Zhang Aizhen has a son and a daughter. She may have neglected to take care of her children in the past, but now her work load is lighter. Whenever she has time, she will be at home with her children, as if she wants to make up for her previous maternal love. Zhang Aizhen's family is quiet and harmonious. Zhang Aizhen's achievements in Shangdang Bangzi have made her artistic aura even more dazzling. At the same time, Shangdang Bangzi has gradually been neglected with the changes of the times. The only opera school in our city has been merged, opera classes have been cancelled, and the opera talents previously trained have been scattered everywhere. There is no longer anything new on the stage of Shangdang Bangzi. The face appeared.

The dilemma that Shangdang Bangzi is about to have no successor has become the most basic obstacle to the development of Shangdang Bangzi. Training Shangdang Bangzi’s successor has become the most critical issue at present. In 1999, at the suggestion of her nephew Feng Huaiyu, Zhang Aizhen funded and founded the "Zhang Aizhen Children's Art Center" in order to cultivate artistic talents with comprehensive qualities. However, over the years, seeing the popularity of dance, painting, piano and other courses, opera has never been taken seriously. Zhang Aizhen felt helpless and sighed: We must seize the time to cultivate opera talents!

As a deputy to the National People’s Congress and a member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference at the provincial and municipal levels for many times, Zhang Aizhen used this special status to propose to the government many plans to reform Shangdang Bangzi, build a grand theater, and open opera classes· ·····However, it has not been implemented so far. Zhang Aizhen also seems very confused and helpless whether the development path of Shangdang Bangzi can still go smoothly.

At present, the stage of Shangdang Bangzi is still mainly supported by a group of actors from the 1980s such as Zhang Aizhen and Wu Guohua. Seizing the time to cultivate reserve talents has become the first key issue to revitalize Shangdang Bangzi. However, in order to comprehensively promote the development of Shangdang Bangzi, it is necessary to be market-oriented and carry out all-round reforms in performance content, role system, stage music, personnel system, etc. Only reform can lead to development.