The Development of Xihe Drum

The West River Drum was developed from the plank drum, and Hetao is the main birthplace of the West River Drum, which originated in the Daoguang and Xianfeng years of the Qing Dynasty, and was popular in Hebei, Shandong, Henan, Tianjin, Beijing, and parts of the Northeast and Northwest China.

Related experts examined, the original name of the West River Drum "plum blossom tune" (so far, the elderly in the rural areas of central Hebei Province is still referred to as the "plum blossom tune"), flowed into Tianjin before the name was changed to the West River Drum. Because the people of Tianjin are used to the Daqing River, Ziya River collectively referred to as the West River, and the original plum blossom drums in the two river valleys are the most developed, in order to distinguish the two, the plum blossom tune from Hebei called "West River Tunes". The West River Drum was born out of the "String Book" and "Single Drum Board" in the middle of the Qing Dynasty. The "String Book" originated from the "Drum Word", which was very popular in the rural areas of Jizhong during the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty (1736-1795), with artists holding strings or three-stringed instruments, playing and singing by themselves, and speaking and speaking in both words and phrases. The "Single Drum Board", also known as the Wooden Drum, originated from the "word story". According to legend, during the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty, Baoding Province artists Liu Chuanjing, Zhao Chuanbi, Wang Lu three people, will be "string book" and "single drum plate" combined file on the same stage, drums, boards, strings, and three, folk artists have to follow suit, and then popularized in Jizhong.

West River drums goblet in the Qing Dynasty, Xianfeng, Tongzhi years, the first artist when push Ma Sanfeng. Ma Sanfeng (birth and death date unknown), real name Ma Ruihe, nickname three crazy, Goyang County people. He studied under Bai Yufu, a wooden drum artist in Hezhang. In many years of artistic practice, he not only consolidated and perfected the woodblock drums and stringed books into one, drums and strings and accompaniment system, and changed the small sanxian into a large sanxian to increase the volume and expand the range of sound. The sound quality has been improved by replacing the wooden simple boards with steel moon-bud boards. At the same time, it also expanded the board style of the wooden drum, which only had one board and one watch, into headboard, two boards, three boards and other boards, and melted the music of leather reed, clappers, old tunes as well as Jizhong folk songs and slang tunes into the drum's singing style, creating new tunes such as double-high, antiphonal, tight five sentences, and one horse and three streams. This formed the basic form of the Xihe drum.

This singing system was later inherited and developed by his disciples Zhu Hualin (1866-1941, known as Daguan), Wang Zhenyuan (1853-1917, known as Maoben, a native of Xiongxian County), and Wang Zaitang (1865-1942, known as Turning Eyes King, a native of Xiongxian County), so that the Xihu Drums gradually developed and matured, of which the contribution of Zhu Hualin seems to have been greater. Among them, Zhu Hualin's contribution seems to be greater. In the process of practicing his art, he collected local folk songs and ditties and studied martial arts, accumulating rich life experience and profound artistic experience. Based on this, he further strengthened Ma Sanfeng's reforms and made them more standardized. Zhu Hualin's artistic style pursues "handsome", "skillful" and "playful", which is called "Zhu School" in the industry. Wang Zhenyuan's artistic style was known for his loud voice and boldness, which was called the "Wang School" in the trade. Around the time of the Xinhai Revolution, the transformation from wooden drums to Xihe drums had matured, and the singing of Chinese books in the rural areas in the form of "catching the temple fair" became popular in the countryside of Hebei Province, and some of the artists entered the cities to make a living. The nearest city to its birthplace was Tianjin, and the earliest performers who came to Tianjin were Zhang Shuanglai, Jiao Yongquan, Jiao Yongshun, Zhang Shide, Zhang Shiquan, Bai Wensheng, Bai Wenming, etc. At that time, there was no name for the Xiehe drums, and the name "Plowshare Piece" or "Plum Blossom Tune" was still called by the rural area, and some of them were just "Plum Blossom Tune".

The drums are also known as the "Plowshare Piece" or "Plum Blossom Tune" in the countryside, or "Talking Book" in some cases.

In 1924, Yixian's Wang Feng Yong in Tianjin "four oceans and peace" and Liu Baoquan and other celebrities, in writing the poster, because Tianjin has Jin Wanchang sang the plum blossom drums (also known as "plum blossom tunes"), in order to differentiate between the name of the West River drums. Because this kind of music comes from the Daqing River, Ziya River Basin, Tianjin people used to call these two rivers as the West River and the lower West River, so the name. Although it was named by chance, it was recognized by peers because it was in line with the actual situation of the genre.

West River drums into Tianjin, initially in the Xicheng Genel area, "put down the book", and later moved into the grass-roots period of the book shed, to the bookstore, teahouse as the main performance venues, and gradually developed into a form of rap long book, so that many actors in the "book of the road! "on the continuous improvement of many actors and actresses in the" book road "on the contrary, its singing on the secondary position, as a result, so that part of the people give up singing to say, to become a commentary on the book actors and actresses, such as Xianshizhang, Zhang Qirong, Zhang Shuxing, Zhao Tianliang, and so on. These people changed to speak after the book, still with the original drum book "book road" for performance, generally speaking, the lack of book that kind of delicate depiction, knowledge, and the book of the book of the book of comments, but can be compact plot for the longest, but also by the welcome of many viewers, and the book of the book of the formation of the trend of equal shares.

Another part of the people are singing a short section of the main, to participate in a variety of integrated opera performances, they are in the original small section of the basis, and to the then-popular Beijing Rhythm Drum drums and other drums to learn, the use of the West River drum tunes, singing a fixed script, in the singing voice to enrich the singing skills to improve the performance in the integrated opera performances. For example, Jiao Xiulan and Jiao Xiuyun, who traveled to and from Beijing and Tianjin, and Ma Zengfen, Ma Zengfang and Wang Yanfen, who settled in Tianjin from Beijing, all made certain achievements in the development of the short sections of the Xihe drum. By the 1930s, the "Zhao School" represented by Zhao Yufeng, the "Hao School" formed by Hao Yingji and his children (Hao Qingxuan, Hao Yanxia, etc.), and the "Ma School" represented by Ma Liandeng, Ma Zengfen, and their father and daughter before and after the founding of the People's Republic of China. The "Horse School" was formed by Hao Qingxuan, Hao Yanxia and so on; before and after the founding of the Republic of China, there was the "Horse School" represented by Ma Liandeng, Ma Zengfen and their daughters, which made the Xihu drums of many different styles and showed a colorful and varied style. From the early Republic of China to the mid-1930s, the Xihe drum entered a period of prosperity, and a number of performers such as Li Dequan (1869-1932, formerly known as Li Pibing, a native of Dacheng County), Wang Yunfeng (1869-1937, a native of Tingxing), Wei Juqui (1875-1946, a native of Qingyuan County), Zhao Yufeng (1894-1971, a native of (1894-1971, stage name Zhao Shuanghe, a native of Hetian City), Cai Baoguang (1898-1976, a native of Gaobeidian City), and other renowned and distinctive actors.

Li Dequan originally sat on a stringed book, and then switched to singing the Xihe drum after discovering its strengths. In the line of art, he pioneered the two-board tail cavity, standardized the common tunes, thus creating the West River drums of the "north mouth", known in the industry as the "Li School". Wang Yunfeng is characterized by "vulgarity", i.e., common words, easy to understand and memorize, which is quite popular among the public. Wei Jukui's artistic style is simple but elegant, euphemistic but not less sincere. Zhao Yufeng, on the other hand, because of his deep friendship with Liang Dianyuan, a book critic, and his acquaintance with Gao Fu'an, a Peking Opera martial artist, he was able to introduce the "buttons" of the book critic and the "stance" of the Peking Opera into the singing of the Xiehe Drums, which was quite in line with the Beijing-Tianjin fashion, and was regarded as the Zhao School by the profession. Cai Baoguang learned both the "Button" and "Body" of Peking Opera. Cai Baoguang not only learned the "Zhu School" of skill, but also learned the "Wang School" of impulsive, and thus became a style of his own, and instantly became famous, and had a great influence in the Baoding area. In the period of the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression and the War of Liberation, the Japanese and the hypocrites in Hebei were in the "fallen area" and the "nationalized area" under the rule of the Kuomintang during the War of Liberation, the livelihood of the artists was difficult and the culture of the book world was indecent, with vulgar bibliographies, and some of the female artists suffered from inhuman abuses. Some female artists were even subjected to inhuman abuse. During this period, the West River Drums had fallen into an extremely miserable trough in the city. In sharp contrast to the fallen areas and the nationalist areas, in the anti-Japanese bases and the liberated areas of Jinchahar-Hebei Border Region under the leadership of the Chinese ****production party, the art of music and art is valued, and has become a powerful weapon to propagandize the masses and fight against the enemy.

Wang Kuiwu, Wang Zunsan, Li Guochun and other Xihe drum artists in the liberated areas of Jizhong and Jixi used the Xihe drum as a weapon of war and made due contribution to the liberation of the people. After the founding of New China, the Xi River Drum gained a new life. As the most numerous artists, the most numerous bibliographies, and the most widely circulated music genre, the Xi River Drum has become the most popular music genre in China. West River drum artists, in line with the central work of the Chinese ****production party, said new books, singing new words, for socialist transformation and socialist construction has contributed. Many artists came back to show their skills again, such as Wang Shuxiang, Wei Bingshan, Li Chenglin, Zheng Ruitian, Zhu Xiaochun, Li Quanlin, Gao Qingn, Li Yuede, Wei Dequan, Wu Yingzhan, and other famous artists, and re-activated the music scene. Ma Zengfen returned to the Beijing opera scene and learned many of the Zhu School's cantatas from Zhu Xiaochun, a famous string master, and then cooperated with her father, Ma Liandeng, to create the emerging Ma School's female cantatas. Wang Yanfen returned from Beijing to her hometown of Baoding to participate in the Provincial Opera Experimental Team, and in 1957, she was broadcast on Hebei Radio as a "Hujiahui", causing a sensational effect. At this time, many famous old actors have collected disciples, such as Liu Dexin of Li County, from 1949 onwards, more than forty members, and passed on more than twenty grandchildren. Liu Dexin and Wang Yanshun, Liu Desan, Li Baoguang four people **** more than 200 disciples, known in the industry as the West River drums in Li County's "four families". Bai Jianzhang, Gao Junping, Zhang Xiaodi, Li Chuntian, Li Xiaohong, Chen Dezhao, Zhao Changfa, etc. were also famous actors at that time, and others, such as Ma Junying (female), Duan Shaofang (female), Nonglianjun (female), Zhao Lanezhang (female), Zhao Hangfen (female), Zhang Xinyan (female), Song Wenzhang, Liu Huanzhang, Liu Yanqin (female), Wang Zengying, Liu Suxian (female), Xu Yinchun, Li Lienkui, Zhao Lianfang, Tao Yanxi (female), Guo Jinling (female), etc., were also well-known performers in Lixian County. Jinling (female), etc., are also this period emerged one after another Xihe drum excellent actors.

In order to strengthen the leadership of the work of music and art t Hebei Provincial Cultural Affairs Bureau in July 1954 set up a working group of music and art. 1956 of the province's folk artists were registered and assessed, and issued a professional performance license to more than 3,866 artists in the West River drum actors no less than 2,000. 1959 the province set up a school of music and art, the type of music to the West River drum-based, and trained a number of newcomers. In 1960, the Hebei Provincial Working Group of Opera and Hebei Provincial Opera Workers' Association held a symposium on the Xihe Drum genre in Tianjin, the capital of Hebei Province, to discuss and study the history of the Xihe Drum and the singing art of various genres. The development of Xihe Drum entered the best period in history. In 1962, with more than 3,000 rural professional artists being all decentralized to the countryside and the dissolution of the Provincial School of Chinese Opera, the development of the Xihe Drum once suffered a setback. During the "Cultural Revolution" in the mid-1960s, a large number of traditional books were lost. After the reform and opening up, the West River drum gradually recovered, the creation and performance of the West River drum, has achieved promising results, a number of new people stand out.

In 1984, Liu Xiaomei of Baoding performed a new Chinese book "Lotus Soul" in the countryside, which was emphasized and encouraged by the leaders. And broadcast on Hebei People's Radio, expanding the social impact. Some generations of storytelling, family learning deep artists, such as Renqiu County, Liu Huanzhang, Cangzhou, Liu Fengxi, etc., are also re-active.

The Tianjin Opera Troupe also featured young performers such as Hao Xujie (daughter of Hao Yanxia) and Yang Yaqin. Yang Yaqin specialized in short sections, and Hao Xiujie played both short and long sections, both of which became familiar to the Tianjin audience.