There are many different ways of learning comedy, and apparently some of them involve bowing to an old Chinese man.
Two weekends ago, I kowtowed to Xiangsheng master, Ding Guangquan. Master Ding is my mentor, teacher, supporter, and biggest fan. Fifty of his seventy years have been spent performing Xiangsheng, making Master Ding a mentor of a type that has all but died out in the West. He is the head of a comedic lineage and tradition stretching back over a hundred years.
Xiangsheng, as a comedy form, originated in the Qing Dynasty. The art form is passed down master to student, meaning that there exists an official “family tree” of every performer who underwent the initiation ritual that I attended last Saturday. Master Ding can trace his lineage to his master, Hou Baolin, the greatest performer of the last century.
By the math of Xiangsheng apprenticeship, this past Saturday I become a member of the eighth generation of Xiangsheng performers. This now means that I am the “little brother” of China’s top comedian Guo Degang, though Guo has not called me to congratulate me yet.
During the ceremony, the daughter of Master Hou delivered a speech focused on maintaining tradition. She urged us to use comedy not just to make people laugh, but to add art to the world with crosstalk. For Master Ding, whose reputation comes from training foreigners to perform Xiangsheng, these words were particularly poignant.