Cui Jichang

01 · Lineage & Regional School

He is the ninth-generation transmitter of the Mei lineage of Jingdong Dagu. Within the regional tradition and school record of Jingdong Dagu Drum Balladry in Langfang, Hebei: It first arose in the mid-Qianlong period of the Qing dynasty in the rural districts of Sanhe, Baodi and Xianghe in eastern Jidong, and later became widely current in the Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei region.

02 · Mastery & Signature Works

Male, Han ethnicity, born in May 1952 in Sanhe, Hebei Province. He showed a gift for singing in childhood and, influenced by the Jingdong Dagu artists of his home region, taught himself to write and sing his own material. He joined the army in 1969, where his Jingdong Dagu was warmly received by officers and soldiers, and he became the cultural mainstay of his company. At the end of 1986 he transferred to the Sanhe Municipal Cultural Centre as a leading performer, and later served successively as director of the centre and head of the Sanhe Pingju Troupe. He is skilled at writing and performing his own works and at accompanying himself as he sings. His singing is impassioned yet rounded, with precise articulation and a full rendering of initial and final sounds; his narrative links tighten ring by ring and deepen step by step. Within the documented technical tradition of Jingdong Dagu Drum Balladry in Langfang, Hebei: In performance one person stands and sings, striking the clappers with the left hand and beating the drum with the right hand to mark the rhythm, with accompanists playing alongside. Its vocal style adopts the banqiang system in structure, and the ban patterns most commonly used include the touban (head ban), erban (second ban), kuaiban (quick ban) and suoban (lock ban). Jingdong Dagu has some one hundred and more traditional works in its repertoire. These include more than thirty long works such as Shi Gong An, Yang Jia Jiang and Da Ba Yi; more than twenty medium-length works such as Shui Lao Shuang He Yin, San Quan Zhen and Luo Tong Sao Bei; short sung pieces such as Xia Zi Guang Deng, Wang Er Jie Si Fu and Wang San Jie Wan Cai together with more than forty spoken-only works with no singing, such as Wang Po Ma Ji, Yang Ba Jie Bai Shou and Bian Da Lu Hua; in addition there are nearly twenty shumao (opening formulas), among them Liang Tou Mang, Shi San Yue Gu Ren Ming and Lao Hu Chi Mao. Representative repertoire, works and technical entries recorded for the project include: "Board patterns": Its metrical system uses opening, second, fast and locking boards, with one singer standing to strike clappers and drum. "Long works": Some thirty long works from a repertoire of over a hundred, with twenty-odd medium-length pieces besides. "Spoken-only pieces": Over forty spoken-only pieces such as Old Mother Wang Curses the Chickens, alongside short sung lyrics. "Preludes": Some twenty short opening preludes including Busy at Both Ends and Ancients of the Thirteen Months.

03 · Transmission & Safeguarding Status

He is a national representative bearer of Jingdong Dagu Drum Balladry, a fifth-batch national intangible cultural heritage project. He took part in thirteen army performances and was named an outstanding performer on each occasion, and more than twenty of his works won awards. In 1984 he became a disciple of Dong Xiangkun, a bearer of Jingdong Dagu. He places great importance on training newcomers: while working at the cultural centre he ran numerous training courses and in 1990 founded a youth arts troupe, nurturing many outstanding talents.

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. Cui Jichang · National Representative Bearer Archive