Canada e tai-hak e pochoa. ----- Original Message ----- From: [David Hsin-Yu Pan](https://web.archive.org/web/20050510203546/mailto: "") Sent: Thursday, September 14, 2000 2:03 AM Subject: A Night of Unconventional Entertainment
Dear All: The following is Lenghui (Ling Huei)'s interview article with the Sheaf, the Uni. of Saskatchewan (Canada) newspaper. Enjoy your reading. Hsin-Yu ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- A Night of Unconventional Entertainment By Joe Geary Sheaf, Vol 92, Issue 7 (14 Sept 2000): B4, B7. Koa-a-hi: Taiwanese Opera A woman talks about how her granduncle sold her to a Taiwanese Opera (koa-a-hi) troupe when she was 16. She has attended a performance of the troupe and, while she was watching the show, her granduncle met with the manager and sold his grandniece to the troupe. This is one of the first accounts in Hsiang-Hsui Lee's documentary film The Lost Kingdom about the rise and fall of the Koa-a-hi troupe Kiong-Lok- Sia. The film was presented Saturday night by Ling-Huei Tsai, the composer of the film's original score, and was sponsored by the University of Saskatchewan Taiwanese Student Association and the Taiwanese Collegian. Koa-a-hi, literally "song theatre," developed in North-eastern Taiwan from signing and storytelling in the 17th century. Dancing and acting, as well as a number of elements from Beijing Opera, were added over time. Banned during the Japanese occupation from 1895~1945, Koa-a-hi became the most popular form of public entertainment afterwards. The Kiong-Lok-Sia, literally the "Making the Goddess Happy Society," was founded by Cheng-san Chen in the 1950s. Poor families sold girls to the troupe, as performing Koa-a-hiwas a better life than prostitution. The Kiong-Lok-Sia performed to sold-out theatres. At its peak, it had a number of troupes touring at the sametime. Because not all of the troupes could sing as well as the others, one recorded its signing and the others would lip sync to it. Chen opened the first Koa-a-hi schooland was responsible for having Koa-a-hi songs written down for the first time. He was also responsible for making the first Koa-a-hi movies,which were also the first movies in the Holo-Taiwanese language. Before the movies had been in Mandarin, which had become Taiwan's official language when the Nationalists came to the island in 1949. Several Koa-a-hi films were made, many starring young actors, and were very popular. Chen's motivation was to produce popular entertainment for profit rather than preserving culture. At one point, he was producing Broadway-like Koa-a-hi stage shows. The film has interviews with the director, the producer, and many actress who were in Kiong-Lok-Sia, as well as Chen's wife. Chen died before the film was made. As well, the film documents a reunion of Kiong-Lok-Sia members in 1996. Today, Koa-a-hi is still popular in Taiwan, mostly being performed on TV and at temples. However, it is "not a cherished part of Taiwanese culture," Tsai said during her presentation. Taiwanese culture has been ignored in textbooks, which primarily focus on (con't B7) Chinese culture, though this is beginning to change. Schools in North-eastern Taiwan teach Koa-a-hi and there is currentlya project to collect the remaining Koa-a-hi films and re-record the songs from them. The director of The Lost Kingdom hopes, Tsaisaid, that her film can be used in schools to educate people about Kiong-Lok-Sia, which many young people today are ignorant of. Unfortunately, due to copyright issues, the full film could not be shown Saturday. As well, the film has not premiered in Taiwan because of financial problem. To close her presentation, Tsai, a Ph.D student at the University of Pennsylvania, played some of the music she composed for the film. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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