Forbidden City slickers

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by RUPERT BOTTENBERG

If you're intrigued by Chinese opera but put off by shrill tones and clanging, crashing, headache-inducing percussion, you'll be pleased to know that the Beijing Kunju Opera Theatre are on their way to Montreal, with a kinder, gentler approach to a genre that reaches back to the Ming Dynasty.

Four decades old and drawing on four centuries of tradition, the Theatre boasts 25 musicians, actors and singers, regarded as the preeminent purveyors of the northern Kunju style--easier on the ears but just as rich in colour, myth and history.

At Centre Pierre-Peladeau on Saturday, Feb. 12 at 8 p.m. (tickets $28.50 and $35.50) and leave the aspirin in the medicine cabinet. :