Characteristics of Northern Sichuan Lantern Opera

The performances of the Northern Sichuan Lantern Opera are close to life, rough and simple, witty and popular, full of songs and dances, full of fun, with simple and healthy lyrics, no fixed program sets, mostly using Northern Sichuan folk songs and dances, miscellaneous or puppets, shadows, monkey plays and jumping Duan Gong's performance techniques, with a strong sense of local flavor. Because there are many small plays, comedies and farces, the clown line occupies a special position in the performance of Northern Sichuan Lantern Opera. There are male clowns and female clowns in the clown line of the lantern opera. Male clowns are also called small flower faces and three flower faces, while female clowns are also called colorful dan, rocking dan, and granny. The female clowns are also called colorful dan, rocking dan and granny. The clowns play the negative characters as well as the positive and intermediate characters. More than half of the many lantern plays have clowns in them.

The Northern Sichuan Lantern Opera was developed from the lantern songs and dances, which included the folk songs of the mountain villages in Northern Sichuan, the Qing Yin, the God's Song, and the Duan Gong tune, and also drew on the Shaanxi tune, the Wu Xia Mending Jar tune, etc. It has the main tune with board changes, and the main tune has the same color as the original tune. It has a system of singing in the form of a plate change, and also has singing in the form of a combination of tunes, such as the play "The Tailor Stole the Cloth", whose singing is made up of a combination of tunes such as "The Year of Peace", "Golden Nuance", "Silver Nuance", "Selling Fresh Flowers", "Falling off the Broken Bridge", "Ten Mile Pier", and "Flower Bow", among others. The combination of plate and song can also be used in the same opera. The main accompanying instruments of the Northern Sichuan Lantern Opera are the "fat tube" and the huqin, which emit a low and thick "buzzing" sound, so they are also called "buzzing tube", in addition to the lantern gongs and drums, etc. Later, the erhu, the huqin and the huqin were gradually added to the repertoire. In addition, there are lantern gongs and drums, and then gradually added erhu, flute and other instruments. The performances of the Northern Sichuan Lantern Opera incorporate the folk dance of lanterns, puppets, shadow puppets, acrobatics and other techniques, which are used to portray the characters and express the plot. The traditional performance of the Northern Sichuan Lantern Opera is carried out at night in the courtyard dam and along the steps, and the audience is peasants, who carry lanterns and torches and surround the field to watch, making the theater a sea of lights. The center of the performance venue suspended an exceptionally bright main lamp, the four corners of the configuration of painted flowers, birds, animals, people or books with "five grains and a good harvest", "six animals prosper", "longevity and prosperity", "congratulations on wealth" words bright and colorful lamps, actors carry lamps, dancing lamps, jumping lamps, the play appeared in the dragon lamp, lion lamps, cattle lamps, or mussel shells lamps, not only props, or exquisite folk crafts, but also the role of the play. The audience watching the performance of the lantern opera is called "watching the lantern", and the actors acting in the lantern opera is called "pretending to be a lantern". Lights on and off the stage, the actors and the audience intermingled, the masses of joy, spectacular.