But rather than recruit students at 8 or 9, once considered the ideal age to begin training, schools that teach traditional opera now enroll students as old as 14.

I noticed there are many pictures of opera stars here.

He has embraced the possibility of moving freely in time and space on the stage with the help of one single gesture or word - as in Chinese opera.

The daughter of an actor and an opera singer from Sichuan Province in the southwest, she worked at China's first private tour operator and is now a successful business consultant.

“It’s such good training that the students can go in almost any direction even if they don’t end up in the opera,” Ms. Liu said.