Chen Yu puts up Yueju Opera performances on Douyin. [Photo/zj.zjol.com.cn]

Chen Yu, a Yueju Opera actress from Ningbo, Zhejiang province, has been putting up live performances of excerpts from classic opera works on video-sharing platform Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok, since April 2021.

Her Douyin account has so far garnered nearly 200,000 subscribers, an impressive figure for a content creator who focuses only on traditional art.

Yueju Opera, which originated in Shaoxing, Zhejiang province in 1906, is China's second most popular traditional opera, following Peking Opera.

Chen started studying Yueju Opera at an art school when she was 17 before joining a privately-owned troupe three years later. Chen has since been consistently honing her acting skills through stage performances, gradually climbing the ladder from supporting roles to taking on leading roles. She specializes in acting the part of young men - most male roles in Yueju Opera are performed by females.

According to Chen, her troupe used to stage 200 performances per year but the number has plummeted to less than 20 since the coronavirus outbreak in early 2020.

"I don't want to stop performing at all. As an opera actress, I have to regularly practice stage skills, otherwise my ability will grow rusty," said Chen, when explaining why she decided to do performances on Douyin.

Every day, the 36-year-old holds two livestreaming sessions on Douyin that span at least six hours in total. She spends about an hour dressing up before each livestream session.

Chen said that she treats each livestream session as seriously as a stage performance, and that she would never host a show unless she is fully prepared.

"I always gain new inspirations every time I act well-known segments from Yueju classics like Butterfly Lovers and Dream of Red Mansions," Chen said.

"My livestreaming audience includes not only traditional opera enthusiasts but also netizens from home and abroad. It is my duty as a Yueju Opera artist to promote the art," Chen added.