Henan Opera

Yu opera (simplified Chinese: 豫剧; traditional Chinese: 豫劇; pinyin: Yùjù), or Yuju opera, sometimes known as Henan bangzi[note 1] (河南梆子; Hénán Bāngzi),[1] is one of China's famous national opera forms, alongside Peking opera, Yue opera, Huangmei opera and Pingju. Henan province is the origin of Yu opera.[2] Henan's one-character abbreviation is "豫" (yù), and thus the opera style was officially named "豫剧" (Yùjù) after the founding of the People's Republic of China. The area where Yu opera is most commonly performed is in the region surrounding the Yellow River and Huai River. According to statistical figures, Yu opera was the leading opera genre in terms of the number of performers and troupes.[3] While Yu opera is often called "Henan opera" in English, within Henan it is considered to be just one of the province's three most important forms of opera, the other two being Quju (曲剧) and Yuediao (越调).

Outside Henan, provinces and areas such as Hubei, Anhui, Jiangsu, Shandong, Hebei, Beijing, Shanxi, Shaanxi, Gansu, Qinghai, and Xinjiang all have professional Yu opera troupes. There is also a troupe in Kaohsiung, Taiwan. The history of Henan opera dates back to more than 200 years ago.[4] The opera was widely spread in Henan province during the late Qing dynasty (1644–1911) and faced new development opportunities after the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949.[4] The opera spread across China and was ahead of the other 300 local operas in China before the mid-1980s.[4] On May 20, 2006, Henan Opera was included in the first national intangible cultural heritage list batch.[5]