Prior to Dr. Xu’s lecture on Chinese opera, my exposure to this art form was only in glimpses from movies.  I was familiar with the general sound of these performances, which I now know is not just a coincidence from movies, but an actual constant in Chinese opera.  The pattern and formula used when singing seems to me like it would get repetitive and tiresome, however the impression I got from Dr. Xu was that this was a staple of Chinese opera dating back over a thousand years.  To the Chinese, not using the formula of rising, falling, flat or mixed tones might be like a musical sung in only one note: very strange sounding.  Hearing the ideal Chinese opera voice, from the early recordings up until Dr. Xu singing herself, was very interesting because of how different my westernized ears heard the songs, versus how some of the Chinese members of the audience heard them.  It sounded strange and different to me, almost like a song played backwards; to them it might have sounded perfectly normal and beautiful.  Often what is the most strange and different is also what is most interesting.