Jin Xiang's "Opera Thinking"

This paper aims to study a few of key issues in the opera creation and performance.Referring to the requirements of doctoral dissertation,this paper intends to explore,through the case of Ji Xiang's achievements in Chinese opera,the ontological language of the art of opera and its general characteristics,with investigation of the meaning of “opera thinking”.By summarizing the purpose of this research and stating its structure,the paper introduces personal intention of Jin Xiang's “opera thinking” and his cultural background.Then the paper develops the four elements of opera creation,which are structure,language,skill and idea,and discusses certain primary problems about his “opera thinking” and the ontological language of musical expressions.It is my intention to reveal,by focusing on the four different versions of the classical opera Savage Land,how the “opera thinking” move from the musical creation to the stage performance,which could be viewed as the transformation of author's creative intention.Most importantly,I will demonstrate the integrality of the “opera thinking”,which means manipulating varied forms of art and utilizing different ways of expressions to establish the logical connections and expand the representative forms of “opera thinking”.Hence we move to the issue of visual thinking in operas and consider it as the transformative factor from music to opera.Furthermore,the paper will examine the visibility and invisibility of the visual thinking and stresses the importance of the visual thinking in evoking the images in the creation and performance of operas,which helps us to understand how the “opera thinking” operate in this process.The final part of this paper,responding to its starting point,observes Jin Xiang's “opera thinking” in the context of history and new development,with reference to the latest studies in the history of western opera.And it is also my hope,through my research,to inspire later discussions and reflections on the tradition and creation of the art of opera.