Zhangzigushu
01 · Historical Records
Zhangzi drum-ballad storytelling is a form of quyi storytelling that took shape in Zhangzi County, Changzhi City, Shanxi Province.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
The performance form alternates between spoken narration and singing, is sung mainly, and is performed in the local Zhangzi accent. Performance most often involves a single person striking a storytelling drum and clapper boards while pulling a two-stringed fiddle to accompany his own singing; later there also appeared performances in which two or more people divided the accompanying instruments and performed together. Since the middle of the twentieth century, performers other than the old masters have mostly used the local Mandarin; the vocal system belongs to the clapper-pattern type, its main clapper patterns being the flowing clapper, the counted clapper, the stacked clapper and the lament clapper; apart from the storytelling drum, the clapper boards and the two-stringed fiddle, bamboo clappers, the banhu and the low two-stringed fiddle are also used. The accompaniment method is of the interlude type: while singing, the instruments are not played. There are also instrumental tune patterns used for the 'naochang' performance that opens the show before the storytelling begins. From the 1980s onward, amplified instruments together with the accordion, gong and cymbals were added, used both for the 'chaotai' performance before a show and for accompaniment when bangzi-style and luozi-style passages are inserted into the singing. Traditional repertoire is mainly of medium and long length, including Jin Zhuo Yu Huan Ji (The Golden Bracelet and Jade Ring), The Bao Gong Case, The Xu Gong Case, The Shi Gong Case, The Hai Gong Case, The Returned Cup, The Returned Dragon and White Jade Tower. Works newly composed since the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression are mainly short pieces, including Wind and Thunder, Xiao Erhei Gets Married, Sister Jiang and Fiery Steel. Zhangzi drum-ballad storytelling has a proud artistic tradition. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, the Zhangzi County quyi troupe built on this foundation stayed active in the county's urban and rural areas, performing for the ordinary people all year round.
Drum, bamboo clappers and self-played erhu
A single performer usually beats the story drum and clappers while bowing his own erhu; accompaniment falls between vocal phrases rather than under them.
The four main metres
Its arias are of the metrical type with flowing, counting, piled and lamenting metres, later joined by electric instruments, accordion and gongs.
Middle- and long-length items
Traditional items run mostly middle- or long-length; these and the court-case cycles were told over many days in the villages.
New items from the war years onward
From the War of Resistance onward new items were mostly short, drawing on modern literature and revolutionary stories.
The warming-up and rousing prelude
Instrumental preludes frame the performance: the naochang before the book begins, and after the 1980s the noisier chaotai with added instruments.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
Especially during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, the anti-Japanese publicity teams composed mainly of Zhangzi drum-ballad performers were extremely active in the southeastern part of Shanxi.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
However, as modernisation keeps accelerating, the survival and development of Zhangzi drum-ballad storytelling face enormous difficulties: the succession of performers is broken, the performance market has contracted, and the heritage is being seriously lost, so rescue and protection are urgently needed. Liu Yinhong (from the official files of associated inheritors): Female, of Han ethnicity, born in August 1972, a native of Zhangzi County, Shanxi Province. She loved drum-ballad art from childhood. Her voice is soft and sweet, her diction clear and her singing mellow and moving, giving her a distinctive style of her own. She has many times appeared on the same stage as well-known quyi artists in Beijing, Tianjin and other places, and in July 2013 went with the China Quyi Artists Association to Paris, France, to take part in the Paris Chinese Quyi Festival. Representative works include Zhang Meiying's Beauty, The Little Couple Return to Their Parents' Home, The Little Couple Carry Water and Come Home More Often. Representative inheritor of the fifth national-level batch of the intangible cultural heritage item Zhangzi drum-ballad storytelling. She performs in the countryside all year round, cultivates a number of young actors by the method of practising through performance, and actively takes part in the various performance and teaching activities that bring quyi into schools, into classrooms and into communities.
05 · Associated Representative Bearers
Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:
- Liu Yinhong 05-2520
- Bao Xianping
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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