Pingxiangchunluo
01 · Historical Records
Pingxiang chunluo is transmitted in Pingxiang City of Jiangxi Province and the areas around it. It developed out of the 'spring announcement' that circulated in western Jiangxi in the late Ming dynasty, and has a history of more than three hundred years to the present.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
Pingxiang chunluo has a lively rhythm and humorous language, and such important expressive features as the 'on-the-spot praise'. Its performance takes two forms, singing while standing and singing while walking. The performer wears a yellow silk or cloth bag over the shoulders, ties a small drum about twenty centimetres in diameter to the left side of the waist, and hangs a bronze gong of the same size on the rim of the drum; the left hand holds the drumstick and the right hand the gong mallet, striking them from time to time to provide the interstitial music for the opening of a tune and for the transitions between sections. Once it was moved onto the stage, single-person singing developed into antiphonal singing and chorus singing, and accompanying instruments such as the erhu, sanxian and pipa were added. Traditional chunluo mostly sang short pieces, such as Praising Spring, Praising Wine, Entering the Gate, Drinking Tea, Pasting the Picture and Seeing Off Spring. Only in modern times did chunluo performers begin to sing medium and long works of history and myth such as The Eight Immortals Crossing the Sea, The Oath in the Peach Garden and Xu Zhenjun Slaying the Serpent Dragon.
Praising Spring
Traditional chunluo mostly sang short pieces, such as Praising Spring, Praising Wine, Entering the Gate, Drinking Tea, Pasting the Picture and Seeing Off Spring.
Praising Wine
Traditional chunluo mostly sang short pieces, such as Praising Spring, Praising Wine, Entering the Gate, Drinking Tea, Pasting the Picture and Seeing Off Spring.
Entering the Gate
Traditional chunluo mostly sang short pieces, such as Praising Spring, Praising Wine, Entering the Gate, Drinking Tea, Pasting the Picture and Seeing Off Spring.
Drinking Tea
Traditional chunluo mostly sang short pieces, such as Praising Spring, Praising Wine, Entering the Gate, Drinking Tea, Pasting the Picture and Seeing Off Spring.
Pasting the Picture
Traditional chunluo mostly sang short pieces, such as Praising Spring, Praising Wine, Entering the Gate, Drinking Tea, Pasting the Picture and Seeing Off Spring.
Seeing Off Spring
Traditional chunluo mostly sang short pieces, such as Praising Spring, Praising Wine, Entering the Gate, Drinking Tea, Pasting the Picture and Seeing Off Spring.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
Pingxiang chunluo circulates over the urban districts of Pingxiang City and in the counties and districts of Xiangdong, Luxi, Shangli and Lianhua, and reaches the adjacent Wanzhai and Yichun of Jiangxi and the area around Liling in Hunan Province. In former times chunluo performers went from village to village around the beginning of the Start of Spring to 'deliver spring' and 'announce spring'; upon entering a household they first beat out a passage of gongs and drums, then improvised verses praising the head of the household according to the family's affairs, a custom known as the 'on-the-spot praise', and the host paid them in rice or money. This house-to-house performing style was later moved onto the stage. Performers also regularly undertook singing at auspicious occasions such as birthdays, business openings and the raising of the roof beam of a new house, forming a tradition in which on-the-spot praise and short praise verses ran in parallel; once it was moved onto the stage, single-person singing developed into antiphonal singing and chorus singing, and instruments such as the erhu, sanxian and pipa were added. The protecting unit is the Pingxiang City Cultural Centre.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
At present, Pingxiang chunluo has few who carry it on, survives with difficulty, and is in urgent need of protection. Yong Kaiquan (as recorded in the official file of the associated inheritor): A man of the Han ethnic group, born in April 1945, native of Pingxiang City, Jiangxi Province. A national first-class performer, and an expert enjoying the special government allowance of the State Council. In 1959 he was admitted to the Pingxiang City Xiang Opera Troupe, and the following year he apprenticed himself to the veteran Pingxiang chunluo performer Rong Xiaoshan and began to engage in singing chunluo. His representative works include The Three Men Peddling Machines, In Praise of Pingxiang, The Sunset Red Like the February Flower and Singing Spring Songs. He is a representative inheritor of the Pingxiang chunluo national-level intangible cultural heritage project in the fifth national-level batch. In 2004 he was awarded the title of member of both virtue and art of the China Quyi Artists Association. In 2009 he was awarded the honorary title of outstanding contributing quyi artist by the China Quyi Artists Association. In 2013 Pingxiang chunluo's Affection Within the Law won first prize in the eighth China Baofeng Majie Story-telling Festival national quyi invitational competition held by the Henan Provincial Department of Culture. In 2014 Pingxiang yugu's The Old Auntie took part in the 'Chinese Dream' national selection of outstanding quyi programmes jointly held by the China Federation of Literary and Art Circles, the China Quyi Artists Association and other units, and won first prize.
05 · Associated Representative Bearers
Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:
- Yongkaiquan 05-2510
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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