Huaibang

01 · Historical Records

Its predecessor was the Haishen (Sea God) play, which had evolved from singing in narrative form around a table to pray for rain; it was formed during the Hongwu and Yongle reigns of the Ming dynasty.

02 · Core Techniques & Process

Huaibang has more than three hundred traditional plays; those most often staged are largely cast with two sheng roles, two dan roles or two painted-face roles, and among the representative repertoire are Fan Xi Jing (Rebelling against the Western Capital), Gu Huai An (The Case of the Ancient Pagoda Tree), Zhang Chun Zui Jiu (Zhang Chun in Drunkenness), Lao Shao Huan (Old and Young Exchanged), Hong Zhu Nv (The Red Pearl Girl), Gan Qin San (Hastening to Qin San), Yuan Men Zhan Zi (Beheading the Son at the Palace Gate), Jiu Tou An (The Nine-Headed Case), Tao Hua An (The Peach Blossom Nunnery), Feng Yi Ting (The Phoenix Pavilion), Lao Zheng Dong (The Old Eastern Campaign) and Wu Nu Bai Shou (Five Daughters Presenting Birthday Greetings). Both in its music and in its performing art, Huaibang has a style entirely its own. It belongs to the banqiang (metrical) system; in performance a jujube-wood clapper is used to beat out the rhythm. Its sung texts are mostly seven-syllable lines, ten-syllable lines and lines of varying length, corresponding one above the other, matching the rhymes and regular in overall structure. Huaibang enacts the words in the local dialect, its vocal style stirring and impassioned, and as the plot requires it often rises to the 'back voice' an octave higher. Its ban forms fall mainly into five great classes, manban (slow beat), erban (two-eight beat), liushuiban (flowing-water beat), sanban (three beat) and feiban (non-beat), and its accompanying instruments include the large string instrument, the banhu, the yueqin, drum and clappers, and the large gong. Huaibang has a complete set of the sheng, dan, jing, mo and chou role types; its performance is bold and uninhibited, and it is skilled in plays that combine civil and martial action with swordplay and with the mangpao (brocade-cape) posture play.

03 · Regional Records & Related Items

Huaibang is an ancient and rare local operatic genre of Henan Province. Because it arose in the area of the old prefecture of Huaqing (present-day Qinyang), it is named Huaibang; it is commonly called Huaqing bangzi, lao Huaibang, xiao bang (ban) xi or Huaidiao, and it circulates mainly in Qinyang, Boai, Jiyuan, Mengzhou, Wenxian, Wuzhi, Xiuwu, Yuanyang, Huojia, Jiaozuo and Xinxiang in Henan. Most of the inhabitants of the former Henei county had migrated from the Hongdong area of Shanxi, so the Haishen play retained the performing forms of Shanxi drama; combined with the local customs and dialect of Henei it gradually formed a vocal genre close to the middle-route bangzi of Shanxi yet marked by the character of the Huaqing prefecture area, its repertoire, vocal styles, speech delivery and music all carrying a strong local colour.

04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding

Most of these traditional plays have no written script and are handed down entirely through the oral teaching of old artists. Because the artistic form of Huaibang is distinctive, strengthening the excavation, rescue and protection of the genre will play an important part in promoting national culture, in research into the Chinese bangzi vocal system, and in enriching and perfecting the history of Chinese theatre. Yet under present conditions the social basis on which Huaibang lives and develops has changed; the performance market is depressed and actors are leaving for other troupes, phenomena so serious that the whole genre faces thin talent and an absence of successors, and urgent measures must be taken to rescue and protect it. Zhao Yuqing (as recorded in the official file of the associated inheritor): Female, Han, born in 1940, a native of Qinyang, Henan Province. Building on the rough and unrestrained boldness that formerly characterised Huaibang, her performance has incorporated the artistic qualities of delicacy and restraint. Her representative works include Fan Xi Jing (Rebelling against the Western Capital) and others. Representative inheritor of Huaibang under the second national-level batch of intangible cultural heritage projects, and a drama master of the Huaibang Association of Qinyang city, Henan Province. Guo Quanren (as recorded in the official file of the associated inheritor): Male, Han, born in 1941, a native of Qinyang, Henan Province. Guo Quanren joined the Huaibang opera troupe of Qinyang county at the age of sixteen, inheriting the instrumental skills of two generations of Huaibang musicians, Liu Chunxiang and Guo Yuxi, and Yang Liyi and Zhang Liukui, and taking full command of the laws and the characteristic features of the Huaibang vocal style. Representative inheritor of Huaibang under the second national-level batch of intangible cultural heritage projects, and a national second-grade instrumentalist.

05 · Associated Representative Bearers

Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:

• Zhao Yuqing 02-0487
• Guo Quanren 02-0488

06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography

1. Huaibang (Qinyang, Henan) · China ICH Official Project Archive
2. Zhao Yuqing · National Representative Bearer Archive
3. Guo Quanren · National Representative Bearer Archive

Sources

China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)

Read the official ihchina.cn record ↗