Nanjing Baiju

01 · Historical Records

Nanjing baiju took shape in the middle period of the Qing dynasty and was already widely current in Nanjing and its surroundings during the Guangxu reign. Local brocade-weaving workers and townspeople would often gather to amuse themselves in their spare hours, singing Ming-Qing popular tunes and Jiangnan minor tunes. After 1949, Nanjing baiju was performed not only in the seated-singing form but also as biaoxian chang (performance singing) and as cai chang (ornamented singing).

02 · Core Techniques & Process

Nanjing baiju is current in the urban area of Nanjing, Jiangsu Province and in its surroundings — Liuhe, Jiangpu and Jiangning — as well as in Lai'an and Tianchang in eastern Anhui. Whenever the Ullambana Festival or a marriage or other joyous occasion fell due, townspeople would often invite the most accomplished amateur singers among the workers to set up a show; the singers "accept the invitation but take no payment", performing free rather than selling their art, hence the name "white show" (baiju). The later commercial performances that did accept remuneration were called "red shows" (hongju). Nanjing baiqu is performed in the Nanjing dialect, singing named tune pieces (paiziqu); its basic performing form is that of a banquet-opening seated performance, that is, a long table is placed in the street, incense and candles are lit, seven or eight people sit around it, one person sings, and the other six or seven accompany on instruments such as the huqin, yueqin, sanxian, sheng, xiao, nao and cymbals. When a red-show troupe performs, it is furnished with embroidered hall-name chair-back drapes, and the staging is somewhat more sumptuous. When poor performers gave a baiju show, they would mostly sing while accompanying themselves in teahouses and taverns, then hold out a teacup to solicit money — commonly called "wiping the table". If a girl was taken along to sing in the streets it was called "yang hua" (scattering blossoms), and singing by blind artists was called "gu mu si xian" (blind-eye silk strings). Its vocal music uses [Shu Ban], a popular tune pattern built on paired upper-and-lower lines; the lines are joined by interlude passages (guomen), so that the pattern can be repeated indefinitely.

03 · Regional Records & Related Items

The content sung in Nanjing baiju is often connected with current affairs, the news and the life of ordinary people at the grassroots. Representative titles include "Da Yi Yuan" (Beating the Member of Parliament), "Ji Fang Ku" (The Hardship of the Weaving Room) and "Wang Lao Tou Pei Cha Hu Gai" (Old Wang Gets a Teapot Lid to Match); there are also titles such as "Jin Ling Bian Di Jing" (Scenery All over Jinling) and "Nanjing Feng Su Jing" (Nanjing Scenery and Customs), which chiefly depict the scenery and social character of Nanjing and are marked by a strong local flavour.

04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding

At present Nanjing baiju has a dearth of successors, has become an endangered genre of quyi, and urgently needs protection and transmission. Xu Chunhua (official archival record of the associated inheritor): Female, Han nationality, born in June 1942, native of Nanjing, Jiangsu Province. When the troupe was dissolved in 1970, she went on to study the art under performers such as Zuo Bangyun, Liang Hanchen and Wu Hongxiang, and insisted on collecting and collating the traditional baiju repertoire, preserving and mastering a large body of traditional baiju tune patterns and singing passages. Her timbre is full and resonant, her vocal line smooth and turning, her performance delicate; she is skilled at shaping character types. She has completely inherited the traditional baiju singing technique that combines singing with spoken narration and articulates the words through a flowing vocal line, and on the basis of the traditional singing method has innovated tune patterns such as "Gai Liang Jian Jian Hua" (improved Jianjianhua), "Xin Chuan Xin Diao" (new Chuanxin tune) and "Kuai Ban Man Jiang Hong" (fast-beat Manjianghong). From 2003 to the present she has successively opened baiju interest classes and public-benefit lectures in kindergartens, primary and secondary schools and higher education institutions across Nanjing, and has established a baiju transmission base. Her representative titles include "Mo Chou Si Nong" (Four Movements of Mochou), "Ya Pian Yan Zi Tan" (The Opium Pipe's Own Lament) and "Gu Ren Ming" (Names of the Ancients). Representative inheritor of Nanjing baiju in the fifth national-level batch of intangible cultural heritage. From 1985 to 2003 she organized former members of the old baiju troupe to restore the work of transmitting baiju, laying a foundation for its transmission and protection. One of her works won third prize in the national selection of outstanding quyi programmes under the title "The Chinese Dream" organized by the China Federation of Literary and Art Circles.

05 · Associated Representative Bearers

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

• Xu Chunhua 05-2514
• Huang Lingling

06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography

1. Nanjing Baiju (Nanjingshiqinhuai, Jiangsu) · China ICH Official Project Archive
2. Xu Chunhua · National Representative Bearer Archive

Sources

China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)

Read the official ihchina.cn record ↗