Beijing Opera appeared in the Qing Dynasty (朝代). In 1790, many opera troupes (戏班) went to Beijing for performances to celebrate the birthday of Qianlong. This kind of unusual performance touched the hearts of the people deeply. While in Beijing, the troupes created a new kind of opera called Beijing Opera. It was on the basis (基础) of Anhui Opera by taking in the advantages of other operas.
Beijing Opera is quite unique (唯一的) in role shaping because it divides the roles into different kinds. They are sheng, dan, jing and chou which are quite different in many ways.
A popular song goes like this, "Foreigners call Jingxi Beijing Opera." In fact, Beijing Opera is different from opera. Opera tells the story and expresses the thoughts by singing instead of speaking. But Beijing Opera stresses (强调) chang, nian, zuo and da. Chang means singing, nian means musical spoken parts, zuo means dance movements and da means martial (武打) skills.
Mei Lanfang is an excellent performing artist of Beijing Opera in China. In 1930, he led an opera troupe to America and presented Beijing Opera before Western people. Today, Beijing Opera has become a sign of Chinese culture. It is changing with the development of different musical styles.
