Dong Xiangkun

01 · Lineage & Regional School

Dong Xiangkun, Male, Unspecified, from Baodi, Tianjin, is a third-batch national representative bearer of Jingdong Dagu Drum Balladry (Ⅴ-10). The tradition is documented in Baodi, Tianjin. Within the regional tradition and school record of Jingdong Dagu Drum Balladry in Baodi, Tianjin: It was formed around the middle of the Qing dynasty. In different periods and different places it went by different names, among them Jingdong qie dagu, Leting diao, Pinggu diao dagu, Pinggu diao, Leting diao dagu, Siping diao dagu, Leting dagu (which shares its name but differs in substance from the Leting dagu formed and popularized in Leting County, Hebei), tiepian dagu, tieban dagu and Chengde local dagu. Jingdong dagu originated in the Sanhe and Xianghe areas of Hebei in eastern Jingdong and in Baodi, Tianjin, and became popular in Langfang, Chengde, Baoding and Tangshan of Hebei, in Huairou of Beijing and in Baodi of Tianjin. When it reached Tianjin in the early 20th century, it was performed in small quyi venues, mainly narrating and singing the long da shu masterworks. In the early 1930s, Liu Wenbin of Baodi, Tianjin, broadcast The Liu Gong Case on Tianjin's commercial radio station, and it was immensely popular with the broad masses; from that point the influence of Jingdong dagu grew day by day and later spread gradually to places such as Beijing and Tangshan. Before 1949, Jingdong dagu had many famous performers, among them Deng Diankui, Yu Qi, Wang Xianzhang, Liu Junhai, Fu Shiting, Zhang Shicheng, Shi Jinrong, Wang Peichen, Wei Xigeng, Liu Wenbin and Qi Wenzhou. In 1933, when the Xianghe performer Yu Jingyuan broadcast The Tale of Shi Lan on the Renchang radio station in Tianjin, he called it Jingdong dagu, and the name Jingdong dagu came into general use from then on. After 1949, the best known performer of Jingdong dagu was Dong Xiangkun, an amateur performer from Baodi, Tianjin. Through the tireless efforts of Dong Xiangkun and his colleagues, Jingdong dagu reached the peak of its development in the 1960s and 1970s, and the influence of the genre spread throughout the northern regions. Since the beginning of the 21st century, because inheritors have decreased and performances are scarce, Jingdong dagu has met an unprecedented crisis and urgently needs support and protection.

02 · Mastery & Signature Works

In 1954 he became a disciple of Liu Wenbin, a celebrated master of Jingdong Dagu. Building on Liu's art, he replaced the Baodi local pronunciation with that of Beijing. In his singing he drew on other art forms such as pingju opera, errenzhuan and shadow puppetry, integrating their merits into a style marked by crispness, brightness, vivacity, vibrato and softness; in vocal production he stressed a bright timbre and the combined use of natural and falsetto voice. He composed a series of new pieces on contemporary life, among them Bai Xue Hong Xin (White Snow, Red Heart) and Song Nü Shang Da Xue (Seeing a Daughter off to University), which were warmly received and widely circulated. To promote the popularization and learning of Jingdong Dagu, he classified its commonly used tunes and specified for each its name, function, sentence patterns, the tonal requirements for the words and a corresponding notation symbol, thereby giving the genre a standardized framework. He devoted his life to transmitting and spreading Jingdong Dagu and trained numerous disciples and amateur performers. Within the documented technical tradition of Jingdong Dagu Drum Balladry in Baodi, Tianjin: Jingdong dagu is a form of quyi drum ballad and drum tune performed by narrative singing in the Jingdong regional accent. The performance form is that one person beats the drum and sings standing, while others, each holding an instrument such as a sanxian or a yangqin, provide accompaniment. Its traditional repertoire and body of pieces is extremely rich. It includes the short drum tunes Wang Po Scolds the Chicken, The Mouse Sues the Cat, Yang Bajie Tours the Spring, Xiangzi Offers Birthday Greetings, Beating the Reed Flowers and The Worthy Sister-in-Law; the medium-length drum ballads The Tale of the Galloping Riders, Lord Bao's Birth, Wang Dingbao Pawns His Goods, Ge Hongxia Sweeps the North and The Case of Lord Liu; and the long drum ballads The Great Eight Righteous Men, The Lesser Eight Righteous Men, The Generals of the Yang Family, The Generals of the Hu Family, The Twin Reunion and The Revolt against the Tang, among others. Keeping the traditional vocal style as its basis, he changed the use of the various Jingdong local accents in performance to narrative singing in Putonghua, further processed and standardized the vocal style, and went on creating new repertoire adapted to the development of the times, winning the deep affection of the broad audience. Representative repertoire, works and technical entries recorded for the project include: "Wang Po Scolds the Chicken": Its traditional repertoire and body of pieces is extremely rich. It includes the short drum tunes Wang Po Scolds the Chicken, The Mouse Sues the Cat, Yang Bajie Tours the Spring, Xiangzi Offers Birthday Greetings, Beating the Reed Flowers and The Worthy Sister-in-Law; the medium-length drum ballads The Tale of the Galloping Riders, Lord Bao's Birth, Wang Dingbao Pawns His Goods, Ge Hongxia Sweeps the North and The Case of Lord Liu; and the long drum ballads The Great Eight Righteous Men, The Lesser Eight Righteous Men, The Generals of the Yang Family, The Generals of the Hu Family, The Twin Reunion and The Revolt against the Tang, among others. "The Mouse Sues the Cat": Its traditional repertoire and body of pieces is extremely rich. It includes the short drum tunes Wang Po Scolds the Chicken, The Mouse Sues the Cat, Yang Bajie Tours the Spring, Xiangzi Offers Birthday Greetings, Beating the Reed Flowers and The Worthy Sister-in-Law; the medium-length drum ballads The Tale of the Galloping Riders, Lord Bao's Birth, Wang Dingbao Pawns His Goods, Ge Hongxia Sweeps the North and The Case of Lord Liu; and the long drum ballads The Great Eight Righteous Men, The Lesser Eight Righteous Men, The Generals of the Yang Family, The Generals of the Hu Family, The Twin Reunion and The Revolt against the Tang, among others. "Yang Bajie Tours the Spring": Its traditional repertoire and body of pieces is extremely rich. It includes the short drum tunes Wang Po Scolds the Chicken, The Mouse Sues the Cat, Yang Bajie Tours the Spring, Xiangzi Offers Birthday Greetings, Beating the Reed Flowers and The Worthy Sister-in-Law; the medium-length drum ballads The Tale of the Galloping Riders, Lord Bao's Birth, Wang Dingbao Pawns His Goods, Ge Hongxia Sweeps the North and The Case of Lord Liu; and the long drum ballads The Great Eight Righteous Men, The Lesser Eight Righteous Men, The Generals of the Yang Family, The Generals of the Hu Family, The Twin Reunion and The Revolt against the Tang, among others. "Xiangzi Offers Birthday Greetings": Its traditional repertoire and body of pieces is extremely rich. It includes the short drum tunes Wang Po Scolds the Chicken, The Mouse Sues the Cat, Yang Bajie Tours the Spring, Xiangzi Offers Birthday Greetings, Beating the Reed Flowers and The Worthy Sister-in-Law; the medium-length drum ballads The Tale of the Galloping Riders, Lord Bao's Birth, Wang Dingbao Pawns His Goods, Ge Hongxia Sweeps the North and The Case of Lord Liu; and the long drum ballads The Great Eight Righteous Men, The Lesser Eight Righteous Men, The Generals of the Yang Family, The Generals of the Hu Family, The Twin Reunion and The Revolt against the Tang, among others.

03 · Transmission & Safeguarding Status

Male, Han ethnicity, born in May 1927 in Baodi County, Tianjin, and died in May 2013. National representative bearer of Jingdong Dagu, a third-batch national intangible cultural heritage project.

04 · Associated Heritage Item Dossier

05 · Fellow National Bearers Lineage

National representative bearers recorded under the same item code, ordered from the first to the sixth batch. Batch order is not a teacher–student relationship.

06 · Archival Sources & Bibliography

1. Dong Xiangkun · National Representative Bearer Archive