Original title: On February 12, 1983, the CCTV Spring Festival Gala was officially opened
What are the classics left by CCTV Spring Festival Gala for 40 years
“Dear viewers, on this joyful New Year’s Eve, all the staff of CCTV wish you and your family happiness, all the best and a happy Spring Festival.” This was the first New Year greeting from the host Zhao Zhongxiang at the CCTV Spring Festival Gala in 1983. From 1983 to 2023, a CCTV show has accompanied several generations of Chinese on New Year’s Eve for 40 years, and people affectionately call it the “Spring Festival Gala”. After 40 years of companionship, “Watching the Spring Festival Gala” has become another folk custom besides posting Spring Festival couplets and eating New Year’s Eve dinner for Chinese around the world.
Year after year, the Spring Festival Gala has developed from a literary gala to a national cultural project; year after year, the Spring Festival Gala has moved from TV screens to multi-screen interaction; year after year, the Spring Festival Gala has developed from a gala to the Spring Festival There will be 25 programs called “Spring Festival Gala” before and after. Over the past 40 years, the Spring Festival Gala has continued to develop, and the audience has higher requirements for it.
Tonight, the CCTV Spring Festival Gala will kick off again. Let us look back on the singing and laughter brought to us by the “Spring Festival Gala” in the past 40 years.
40 years of singing
The proportion of song programs is the largest, and new features have appeared in the past two years
The Spring Festival Gala is a comprehensive party. If you ask which type of program is the most popular on the stage of the Spring Festival Gala, it should be a song program-this has been the case for nearly 40 years.
“Your figure, your singing voice, will always be imprinted in my heart!” Li Guyi sang “Hometown Love” in the first Spring Festival Gala in 1983. Li Gu sang six songs in a row, becoming the most of the year. Subsequently, many golden songs appeared in the Spring Festival Gala, from “Shepherd’s Song” and “Ocean, My Hometown” sung by Zheng Xulan to “Clouds in My Hometown” and “A Fire in Winter” sung by Fei Xiang; from “My Chinese Heart” sung by Zhang Mingmin From “Go Home and Have a Look” sung by Chen Hong, Cai Guoqing, Jiang Tao, etc.; from “Meet Nine Eight” sung by Faye Wong and Na Ying to “Spicy Girl” sung by Song Zuying and Jay Chou. The golden song of the Spring Festival Gala undoubtedly became the hottest song of the year, and it has been passed down to this day and has become a classic.
In the past two years, the song programs that account for the most in the Spring Festival Gala show new features: fewer solo programs and more chorus programs; more and more non-professional singers, especially film and television actors, join song programs. According to the statistics of the Beijing Youth Daily reporter, due to the increase in the number of people, the per capita performance time of the singers on the Spring Festival Gala stage is getting less and less: in 1983, the per capita performance time was 4.5 minutes, and in 1984 it reached 5 minutes, and has been declining since then.
As a veteran singer in the Chinese music scene, Jiang Yuheng still has a fresh memory of his first appearance on the Spring Festival Gala stage, “I first appeared on the Spring Festival Gala stage in 1991 and sang “Looking Back”. Look at me!” That night not only made Jiang Yuheng popular, but also made this song “Looking Back Again” a classic. In the 2023 CCTV Spring Festival Gala in the Year of the Rabbit, Jiang Yuheng will sing “Cheers to the Past”, but the performance format and guests have a new interpretation. Let us look forward to this year’s Spring Festival Gala “this old altar” and what “new wine” has been brewed.
40 years of laughter
Language programs are the most anticipated training for the “New Forces of Comedy”
If you ask the Chinese audience which type of program they are most looking forward to in the Spring Festival Gala, it must be a language program. The language programs on the stage of the Spring Festival Gala are divided into skits and cross talks. In 2023, new member talk shows will be added. Beginning in 1989, sketches replaced cross talk as the first protagonist of the Spring Festival Gala, and this situation continues to this day. Throughout the previous Spring Festival Gala, the number of skits was the largest in 1993, reaching 9, and has remained at six or seven since then. Although the number is far from the number of singing and dancing programs, the duration of the two is comparable, and sometimes the overall duration of sketch programs is longer than that of singing and dancing programs.
As the highest stage of Chinese literature and art, CCTV Spring Festival Gala has always been its mission to cultivate newcomers. In fact, the stage of the CCTV Spring Festival Gala has always been a training ground for “new forces of comedy”. In the era when cross talk was the mainstream of comedy, “Ah Q’s Monologue” performed by Yan Shunkai at the first CCTV Spring Festival Gala in 1983 used the performance form of “sketch” for the first time. The skit shows are constantly appearing in the Spring Festival Gala. Many actors have changed from veteran actors in their respective fields to “new comedy forces” because of participating in the Spring Festival Gala skits, such as Zhao Lirong who sings and criticizes operas, Chen Peisi and Zhu Shimao who act in movies, etc. In the past two years, more and more film and television actors have also joined language programs, which not only enriched the stage, but also let the public see new ideas.
Experts watch the innovations in form, while ordinary people like to watch language programs mainly because they are funny. After the Spring Festival Gala, “buzzwords” will definitely appear, such as “I miss you so much”, “You have a big face and a thick neck, you are either rich or a cook”, “You are so talented”. The golden sentences of the Spring Festival Gala every year will definitely spread to the streets and alleys.
In the 2023 CCTV Spring Festival Gala in the Year of the Rabbit, it is estimated that eight language programs will be staged, including the happy twist sketches that the audience is looking forward to, the cross talk of Yue Yunpeng and Sun Yue, and the talk show group that is popular with young audiences.
dance for 40 years
The popular dance works of the Spring Festival Gala will lead the performance market in the coming year
In the past 20 years, with the booming performance market, the Spring Festival Gala dance programs have come out of their own brand-new model – the popular dance works of the Spring Festival Gala will lead the performance market in the new year. From Yang Liping’s dance drama “Peacock” to the popular “Avalokitesvara” in 2005, to “Only This Green”. The success of these dance dramas has given new light to the road of the “Spring Festival Evening Market”.
On the stage of the Spring Festival Gala, dance programs are not small, ranking third in the program distribution with 12%, but the innovation of dance programs has been exerted since the past 20 years. Over the past 40 years, the dance programs of the Spring Festival Gala have also undergone significant changes: the protagonist has changed from a dance artist to a high-quality dance group, and from an individual to a group.
Judging from the performance market, the Spring Festival Gala dance drama is undoubtedly a success. Take “Only This Green” as an example. After the Spring Festival Gala, every place it went was full, and many viewers commented on it as “a top performance”. From offline to online, the popularity and word-of-mouth of “Only This Green” has “won numb”. Will the 2023 Year of the Rabbit Spring Festival Gala have dance masterpieces like “Avalokitesvara”, “Pretty Sunset” and “Just This Green”? It is worth looking forward to.
40 years of making stars
From who is popular and who is popular to who is popular and who is popular. Netizen comments are “counting stars”
Without the Spring Festival Gala, the combination of Fei Xiang, Song Dandan, Tai Lihua, Liu Qian, and the Auspicious Three Treasures might not be where they are today. CCTV has selected “My Favorite Spring Festival Gala Program” since 1990. A reporter from Beiqing Daily combed through previous reports and found that the Spring Festival Gala had a strong ability to create stars in the early days of its establishment, and a new “popular king” was born almost every year. As an artist, whoever can be on the stage of the Spring Festival Gala means “witnessing a miracle”.
From the 1980s to the 1990s, many singers sang a song in the Spring Festival Gala and enjoyed it for life. For example, Su Xiaoming, who sang “Night of the Military Port” in 1986, and Fei Xiang, who became popular in the Spring Festival Gala in 1987, “Clouds in Hometown” and “A Fire in Winter” stole the limelight.
Not only singers, language programs are also important places for newcomers. The 1989 Spring Festival Gala skit “Lazy Blind Date” made Beijing artist Song Dandan popular all over the country, and the Spring Festival Gala sketch made Song Dandan on the comedy stage.
The same is true for other types of programs. The Taiwanese magician Liu Qian, who appeared in the 2009 Spring Festival Gala, unexpectedly became popular. The phrase “witness a miracle” became Liu Qian’s most famous line. On the Spring Festival Gala, audiences around the world also got to know Liu Qian and his close-up magic.
In recent years, the star-making ability of the Spring Festival Gala has gradually decreased, which is related to the adjustment of its casting thinking, from whoever gets popular to whoever gets popular. Netizens once commented that the Spring Festival Gala was about “counting the stars”—inviting the most popular stars of the year to the Spring Festival Gala, so that stars such as Zhang Yixing, TFBOYS, and Lee Min Ho had the opportunity to be on the stage of the Spring Festival Gala and boost the ratings.
“Farewell tonight, farewell tonight, no matter new friends or old friends, we will invite you again next spring…” When the song “Unforgettable Tonight” tailored for the Spring Festival Gala sounds, it means that the new year has really come. In the 40 years of the Spring Festival Gala, this song has been sung 26 times. The 2023 CCTV Spring Festival Gala in the Year of the Rabbit will still have “Unforgettable Tonight”. The Spring Festival Gala is still there, and our joy is still there.
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