Wang Rongtang

01 · Lineage & Regional School

He has loved music since childhood. In his early years he studied gongche notation and the bamboo flute under veteran artists, and he joined a luogu xiao paizi, or small gong-and-drum ensemble, band, carrying the drum and playing small percussion instruments. Within the regional tradition and school record of Shifan Music in Jiangdu, Jiangsu: Shaobo luogu xiaopaizi absorbed the essence of Daoist music, of the coarse-and-fine shifan (silk-and-bamboo music) and of the local "New Year gong and drums", linking multiple tune patterns into suite pieces and alternating sizhu music densely with percussion, forming a distinctive musical school among the Yangzhou and Lixiahe paizi tunes. Shaobo luogu xiaopaizi takes the folk ensembles of the Shaobo Town area as its main body, and its performance is divided into zuotai and caijie: zuotai is seated performance on an erected platform, used by the Guanyin association and the Ullambana association; caijie is street processional performance, used chiefly in the Dongyue Temple fair procession on the twenty-eighth day of the third lunar month each year. It has more than thirty tune patterns, with twelve representative paizi pieces in all, which have been included in the Jiangsu volume of the Collection of Chinese Folk and National Instrumental Music; as a musical genre it also absorbs the essence of Daoist music, of the coarse-and-fine shifan and of the local "New Year gong and drums", linking multiple tune patterns into suite pieces. The Shaobo luogu xiaopaizi circulated in Shaobo Town of Jiangdu City, Jiangsu Province, is a form of folk instrumental music with distinctive character in the central Jiangsu region. It originated in the Ming dynasty, took shape in the Qing dynasty, developed during the Republican period and flourished in the early years after the founding of the People's Republic of China, and it has a comparatively long history of development.

02 · Mastery & Signature Works

Male, of Han ethnicity, born in August 1937 in Yangzhou, Jiangsu Province. He once served as a musician in an opera troupe, proficient in the bamboo flute, erhu, pipa, sanxian, and xiao; he has also mastered percussion instruments including the clapper drum, large drum, tanggu drum, gong, cymbals, small plates, and small wine cups. He performs pieces such as "Cymbals: A Gourd Bobbing Up from the Water" and the small porcelain-dish pieces "Reaching Out to Grasp the Moon" and "A Single Horse" with great skill. He took the lead in establishing the Gantang Cultural Activity Center and founded the Shaobo Town Transmission Studio for Folk Instrumental Music and Folk Song Singing, where he teaches in person. Folk instrumental pieces he collected and arranged, including Shiba Sheng (Eighteen Provinces) and Baduan Jin (Eight-Section Brocade), were included in the National Collection of Ethnic and Folk Instrumental Music. Within the documented technical tradition of Shifan Music in Jiangdu, Jiangsu: Shifan music is also called "ten classes" or "five pairs", taking its name from the ten instruments played, which are made of silk, bamboo, leather, wood and metal. This music is light and lively, strongly rhythmic, harmonious in pitch and pleasing to the ear, and it is widely circulated in Fujian, Guangdong, Jiangsu, Zhejiang and other parts of China. Most shifan melodies come from folk minor tunes and huapa (suona pieces); they have also drawn much nourishment from opera, quyi storytelling and song tunes. Their performing forms are divided into seated performance, marching performance and dancing performance, and the player in charge of the clapper boards normally acts as the conductor. The performance of Shaobo luogu xiaopaizi is divided into zuotai (seated on a platform) and caijie (marching in the street). Zuotai refers to seated performance on an erected platform, the form used by the Guanyin association and the Ullambana association; caijie refers to street processional performance, used chiefly in the temple-fair procession of the Dongyue Temple on the twenty-eighth day of the third lunar month each year. Displaying virtuoso technique is a major feature of luogu xiaopaizi. In the history of luogu xiaopaizi, the high-register huqin player Yan Qi's "playing the erhu on top of his head" and the gong-and-drum player Cheng Helin's "nao and bo — a gourd bobbing up out of the water" caused a sensation in their day and drew enthusiastic applause. Characteristic light percussion is another feature of luogu xiaopaizi; its performers all have strong expressiveness, such as being able to strike small porcelain dishes and small wine cups with chopsticks held in the teeth. Most of the tune patterns played by luogu xiaopaizi are local folk minor tunes rich in rustic flavour. According to surveys and statistics it has more than thirty tune patterns, with twelve representative paizi pieces including Ba Duan Jin, Shi Ba Sheng, Shi Ba Sheng Jia Tang Zi and Ying Wu Ge; all of these have been included in the Jiangsu volume of the Collection of Chinese Folk and National Instrumental Music. Representative repertoire, works and technical entries recorded for the project include: "Ba Duan Jin": One of the representative paizi pieces of Shaobo luogu xiaopaizi, included in the Jiangsu volume of the Collection of Chinese Folk and National Instrumental Music. "Shi Ba Sheng": One of the representative paizi pieces of Shaobo luogu xiaopaizi. "Shi Ba Sheng Jia Tang Zi": One of the representative paizi pieces of Shaobo luogu xiaopaizi, being the jiatang linking variant of Shi Ba Sheng. "Ying Wu Ge": One of the representative paizi pieces of Shaobo luogu xiaopaizi.

03 · Transmission & Safeguarding Status

He is a representative bearer of Shifan Music (Shaobo Luogu Xiao Paizi), a fourth-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. Wang Rongtang · National Representative Bearer Archive