Where did Xiushan Lantern originate?

Xiushan Lantern is named after the most representative lantern art in Xiushan Tujia and Miao Autonomous County, Chongqing. Also known as jumping lights, lighting lights and lantern show. It is an ancient folk song and dance rap art, which is widely spread in Tujia areas at the junction of Sichuan, Hunan, Guizhou and Hubei provinces. Xiushan Lantern is a folk song and dance loved by Tu, Miao and Han people in Xiushan Tujia and Miao Autonomous County, Chongqing. It has a long history and is spread all over the county, especially in the towns and villages such as Pass, Qingxi, Lanqiao, Pingkai, Yingfeng, Yongdong, Haiyang, Rongxi, Yilong and Yuping. Xiushan Lantern has two traditional forms of performance. Let's take a closer look at the artistic features of Xiushan Lantern! Xiushan Lantern is a folk song and dance loved by aborigines, Miao and Han people in Xiushan Tujia and Miao Autonomous County, Chongqing. It has a long history and is spread all over the counties, especially in Pass, Qingxi, Lanqiao, Pingkai, Yingfeng, Yongdong, Haiyang, Rongxi, Yilong and Yuping. Xiushan Lantern Festival is an important school of Lantern Festival art in southwest China. It is a folk cultural phenomenon and a folk performing art that integrates religion, folklore, singing and dancing, acrobatics and paper binding art, and it is a valuable cultural heritage of our national folk music. Xiushan Lantern is named after the most representative lantern art in Xiushan Tujia and Miao Autonomous County, Chongqing. Also known as jumping lights, lighting lights and lantern show. It is an ancient folk song and dance rap art, which is widely spread in Tujia areas at the junction of Sichuan, Hunan, Guizhou and Hubei provinces.

1. Historical origin of Xiushan Lantern Festival

Xiushan Lantern originated in Tang and Song Dynasties, continued in Yuan and Ming Dynasties and flourished in Qing Dynasty. It is a comprehensive performing art that combines song, dance, drama and folk percussion, and mainly focuses on song and dance performances.

Xiushan county is known as the hometown of lanterns. Its lantern dance originated from the "Lantern Opera" of the Han nationality, and then merged with the singing and dancing performance skills of Tujia and Miao people in Xiushan, and developed into an artistic form with novel style, moving singing and dancing, which was deeply loved by the Han, Tu and Miao people.

Xiushan Lantern is a simple, humorous, lyrical and beautiful comprehensive art that combines song, dance and rhyme with percussion instruments and strings. According to historical records, it originated from the "Dance Troupe" in the Yuan Dynasty (that is, men and women sang and danced on a table of the Eight Immortals). In the Ming Dynasty, it was included in the song and dance performances of some tea-picking operas and was called "Lantern". Later, it developed into a flower stand, a unilateral lantern show and a modern lantern show.

Xiushan Lantern Festival starts from the second day of the first month and ends on the fifteenth day of the first month. After sixteen, it is called "thick-faced lantern". The traditional performance of Xiushan Lantern is not limited to venues, such as dams, halls and streets, as long as there is flat land above 10 square meters. Due to the needs of the performance form, style and content of lantern classes around the country, there are also special venues. For example, the performance of "high-platform lantern" requires two or three traditional and old-fashioned wooden square tables, and two performers perform lantern-to-lantern duets on the desktop, overlapping the heights of several tables. A lantern show requires "building a stage" and simple scenery, and is usually performed on the earthen platform or diaojiao building of the dam. After hundreds of years of development, Xiushan Lantern has gradually formed a unique folk art.

2. Artistic features of Xiushan Lantern Festival

1. convention

At first, it was a lantern performance with strong song and dance elements, and later it was influenced by major operas such as Yunnan Opera. When the artists of the Lantern Festival improved the complex repertoire, they also absorbed the relevant tunes to change, expand and renovate it, and created new tunes of the Lantern Festival. The newly compiled light tone adopts the arrangement method of continuous tone, which has some characteristics of Banqiang music and is suitable for performing traditional plays. In addition, there are various folk songs and minor tunes in Xiushan Lantern Opera, which occupy an important position in the whole drama.

2. Dynamic law

The performance of Lantern Festival attaches great importance to dance. The basic dynamic feature of lantern dance is "twisting", and there is a saying that "nothing can be done without twisting" The viewer looks at the lantern dance to see whether it is "twisted", that is, whether the waist and buttocks are greatly twisted, whether it is flexible and coordinated, and whether the posture is natural. Special emphasis is placed on the natural posture, the foot shape is not stretched and hooked, and it naturally rises and walks out; The gesture of the hand should swing naturally with the footsteps and dance like a willow, so the gesture of "twisting the step" is called "swinging the willow with the wind".

Out of town is the basis of lantern dance. "Waist", the twist of the waist and buttocks should match the flexion and extension of the knees, and the twist of the buttocks should be larger. In addition, there are steps such as "equal step", "positive step", "backward step", "stepping on step", "oblique fan" and "snail turning back". In these movements, it is necessary to highlight the dynamics of the waist. "All kinds of deviant lanterns often correspond to some characters, such as the simplicity and generosity of' upright people deviant' and the lyrical leisure of' women deviant';" The arrogance of "Great Contradiction" is tall and straight; "The lightness and liveliness of boys' anti-twisting and the flexible stretch of' stepping on'." The wine is relaxed and lively, and the "big jump" is vigorous and steady.

In addition to the "twisting step" of the lantern, the dance posture is also very unique, including "turning step" and "jumping step" The "turn step" includes "twist step", "cover the fan and turn over the flowers", "snow cover the top", "small fish holding water", "rock eagle spreading its wings" and "Yuanyang grabbing legs". "Jumping" includes "jumping", "lateral jumping", "toad jumping", "back kicking", "jumping", "carp crossing the river" and "oolong reaching".

The "crooked step" is accompanied by the movement of the hand, which is manifested in various changes in the props in the hand and "flowers in the hand" and "flowers in the fan". For example, the flowers in hand are flat flowers, lower flowers, pick flowers, back flowers, double flowers, side towels, small towels and back towels. There are more "fan flowers". It is said that there are more than 70 kinds of changes, and some names are particularly poetic, such as "holding the moon", "dragonfly water", "golden silk rolling hydrangea", "snowflake covering the top" and "phoenix nodding". These arrangements add to the emotional appeal and charm of the Lantern Festival.

3. Music

Xiushan Lantern is famous for its beautiful melody, bright rhythm and unique style, which is widely circulated. The famous lantern song "Boxwood Pole" and "A handful of rape flowers" climbed into Guofeng Hall, enjoying a good reputation at home and abroad.

Xiushan Lantern Music, in addition to foreign musical elements, also incorporates local folk songs, ballads, ditties, operas and other beneficial elements, forming a musical form with local national styles and customs, with beautiful melody, novel mode, standardized structure, distinct rhythm and distinct dance, giving people a sense of humor, joy and pleasure.

4. Form

After a long period of development and evolution, the performance forms of Xiushan Lantern Festival are: lantern duet (single lantern performed by two people), double lantern (double lantern performed by four people), lantern dance (group lantern performed by many people), lantern play (drama) and so on. In the performance, the lyrics sung by the actors are called lanterns. Yuanxiao Ci has a strong local flavor, which states the content, expresses the plot, expresses the emotion and attracts the audience. Among them, some Deng Hua Ci absorbed some folk tunes of Han nationality, including original lyrics of landlord dramas such as tea-picking dramas and ancient painting dramas.

Apart from the lantern show, there are only two characters in the show, one is ugly, the other is Sister Yao, and the clown is Lai or other names. When dancing, Yao Jie wore long hair and a big-breasted skirt, with a silk-edged folding fan in her right hand and a colorful towel in her left hand, straightened her waist, walked with tinkling steps, sang and danced, and performed innocent, lively, humorous and provocative roles. Lai tied the headscarf into a "half-moon", wore a double-breasted dress, tied a red ribbon around her waist, held a big cattail fan in her hand, stepped on the short pile steps, and turned around her sister with the action of "swinging willows in the wind" to perform a funny and humorous role. The lyrics are flexible, long or short. They can sing on a long road, and actors and audiences can communicate with each other and blend in.

5. Performance procedures

Xiushan Lantern Festival has a complete set of procedures, mainly including: setting up a lighting hall, turning on the lights (please turn on the lights), jumping the lights and returning the lights.

In Xiushan Lantern Festival, the Lantern Festival is a traditional and ceremonial performance. Lantern class should set up a lantern hall to worship the gods such as "Miss Jinhua" and "Yin Hua Ernian" before putting out lanterns, and the lantern master will light incense sticks and burn paper money to worship the lantern god, praying and wishing the people who dance lanterns all the best, peace and good luck. After the worship ceremony, they sang and danced in the lamp hall. First, the lighting engineer will lead the singing of An Wei, Singing Wei and Opening the Light, and then everyone will sing "Lighting Song" and the song to be performed. After the lantern invitation ceremony, the lantern class can go out and dance lanterns.

Jumping lanterns is the main performance of Xiushan Lantern Festival. Lantern classes are all jumping around the halls and dams of lantern pickers. Sing "Watching Lights Tune" and "Congratulatory Tune" first, and sing "Xie Zhudao Tune" when leaving.

On the fifteenth night of the first month of each year, the Lantern Festival class will hold a Lantern Festival ceremony on the riverside dam to worship the gods and sing "Send the Lantern Tune". The master of lighting will lead all the lantern tunes sung during the Spring Festival (called the Lantern Tune). Then burn lanterns and shrines, throw the clothes of the lantern jumpers out of the fire, and pray for the safety of the lantern jumpers for one year.

3. The main repertoire of Xiushan Lantern Festival

Xiushan lanterns are mainly distributed in Lanqiao, Rongxi and Erong areas of Xiushan. The main repertoires are: Cowboy Watching Cattle, Watching Cattle Playing Chess, Third Daughter-in-law Respecting Life, Hooper Hooper, Daughter-in-law Pan Hua, Cousin Pan Hua, Wife Pan Hua, Three Bowls of Rice Pan Hua, Flower Drunk, Xu's adopted son, and Xu's matchmaker's words. Scenery of the four seasons, Wan Huachi, Bao Er cuddling girls, tailors stealing cloth, Liu Huzi's brother playing chess, fishing for help, Aunt Wang mending the jar, sending flowers and swords, delivering rice safely, sending newspapers, quarreling with five watches, etc., have more than 30 discounts. Most of these plays reflect people's labor, love and daily life. They are lively, relaxed, humorous and have a strong local flavor. Although the content is monotonous and shallow, it is deeply loved by the people.

Fourthly, the inheritance value of Xiushan Lantern.

In the long-term performance, Xiushan Lantern has formed the characteristics of dancing, singing, drama, simulation, nationality, regionality, procedure and mass, and is deeply loved by the masses. Rescuing and protecting Xiushan Lantern is of great practical significance and academic value for enriching people's cultural life and promoting the study of Tujia folk music and dance art and its history.