How to pronounce “xian” in English

Xiangsheng is performed in Mandarin, a lot of times you'll have dialect coming in.

Because Xiangsheng originally came from a Beijing opera background, a lot of traditional opera pieces or different types of singing have come back

We do Xiangsheng in many different places.

We do Xiangsheng on stage.

We do Xiangsheng in my friend's living room.

We do Xiangsheng basically wherever we get the chance.

One called Nan Xiang who does really great soup dumplings.

A regular xiangqi palace-- Chinese chess palace, where you could go and you can watch other people play.

This is me performing with my Xiangsheng Master Ding Guangquan.

And so what we have in Xiangsheng is this master-student relationship, which is actually very unique among comedy.

But because of the way that Xiangsheng started, we have this whole master-student family tree going all the way back into the past.

It's called the Great White Pyramid of Xian.

it. So Xiangsheng is a traditional Chinese performance art.

So I'm a member of the eighth generation of Xiangsheng performers.

So if you go and talk to a Chinese person about Xiangsheng, about crosstalk, they'll say, oh, I know Xiangsheng.

Mrs. is the wife of one of my Xiangsheng teachers, ,, who I do Xiangsheng with.

My Fulbright project was to learn about Chinese comedy, specifically Xiangsheng, by apprenticing to Master Ding Guangquan and learning how to do Chinese comedy.

But first off, I want to tell you all a little bit about Xiangsheng.

So I'm going to give you a little bit of an intro to what is Xiangsheng, and then tell you about my experience learning

So I'm going to show you a little bit of a clip of what the Xiangsheng actually winds up looking like.

So shuo, the speaking skill is talking about how Xiangsheng, it's a linguistic performance art.

So they get incorporated into the comedy, and this is one of the ways that Xiangsheng is a little bit unique from Western style

I had when I came over as a researcher, because I started studying Xiangsheng as a Fulbright scholar, and one of the questions I had was,

But it's fun. So in part of learning Xiangsheng, I learned some Beijing opera, I learned from Shandong opera, I learned some ,,

Technically, there's a special type of singing called which is special to Xiangsheng.

Everything from everyday things, but one of the things that makes Xiangsheng very interesting is you also have these ,, these traditional pieces that have been passed down

And the first time I met her is because I went over her house to practice Xiangsheng with her husband, and when she came in,

So this is part of the fun of what I've been doing here, is I've been trying to mix learning the traditional Chinese style of Xiangsheng

And even I've found that a lot of people from China, they know a little bit about Xiangsheng, but they haven't necessarily studied it that much,

In China, traditionally we have these tea rooms, these tea houses where you watch Xiangsheng shows, and if you go to see a show, the audience will sit down,

and they have a lot of routines that, if you listen to them now, sound a little bit like Xiangsheng.

Like for instance, there's this one comedy bit called ,, traditional Xiangsheng piece.

Dou is joking. So the Chinese friends know this is ,, who's probably one of the most famous Xiangsheng performers right now.

And so I was very happy that Master Ding had actually already written a book in which he listed all the different ways that Xiangsheng performers get