Taige

Ⅹ-87Folk CustomsTonghai, YunnanBatch 3 (2011)Extension Item

01 · Historical Records

During the Ming and Qing dynasties, military-colony immigrants brought the "raised platforms" (taige) and "floating colours" (piaose) of Guangdong, Fujian and other provinces to Yunnan.

02 · Core Techniques & Process

The Tonghai High Platform is a form of taige performance preserved within the traditional festive folk activities of Tonghai County, Yunnan Province. The Gaotai Gathering Stele, erected on the twenty-seventh day of the fourth month of the twenty-second year of the Daoguang era of the Qing dynasty (1842), records that the welcoming of high platforms in the two former counties of Tonghai and Hexi (now a town under Tonghai County) arose in the Qianlong era of the Qing dynasty, beginning at Qijie (now a town under Tonghai County), and spread to Hexi Town, Tonghai Town and the various villages. High-platform processions are mostly held on the sixteenth day of the first lunar month each year, and are called "welcoming" the high platforms. In ordinary years there are twelve platforms; in leap years there are thirteen. The difficult point in the craft of making a high platform is to avoid exposing the "sinews and bones". The so-called "sinews and bones" refers to the iron rods that support the entire stage. Achieving a natural, seamless result is the signature skill of the high-platform artisans. The high platform is a mobile stage: one high platform is one opera. Children of four to five years of age, selected and trained, dress up as various roles, and the content presented is mostly opera stories. The high-platform procession is accompanied by wind-and-percussion music, as well as folk performances such as donkey lanterns and dragon lanterns.

Receiving the high platform on the sixteenth

The platforms are all brought out once a year, touring from the county town into the villages as people crowd the route.

Hiding the iron armature inside the costume

The whole stage rests on an iron frame, yet the craft lies in concealing it so the children seem to float.

Twelve platforms, thirteen in a leap year

Twelve platforms go out in an ordinary year and thirteen in a leap year, and the count is the annual measure of a guild's standing.

Children on stage in costume

Players are picked at four or five and drilled until they can carry a role aloft, learning whole plays without noticing.

Donkey lanterns and dragon lanterns in tow

Wind bands and small lantern troupes such as the donkey and dragon lanterns keep the procession unbroken.

How the greeting platform began at Qijie

Began in the Qianlong period at Qijie and had spread across two counties by the time the stele was raised in 1842.

03 · Regional Records & Related Items

As recorded in the Gaotai Gathering Stele, the welcoming of high platforms in the two counties was organized by "gathering" (hui) rather than by village: once a village established a gathering, one or several villages would join forces to put up one platform, and the number of platforms directly marked the prestige of that gathering in the countryside. In the Qianlong era Qijie took the lead; during the Jiaqing and Daoguang eras the practice spread in turn towards Tonghai Town, Hexi Town, Sijie and Yangguang (now a town under Tonghai County), and competition and mutual observation developed among the gatherings. The bamboo and timber used for the platforms, the raised-platform troupes and the wind-and-percussion bands circulated among the villages year after year, and in this coming and going the craft was passed on layer by layer. The performers chosen by the old artisans were without exception boys of four to five years of age; parents handed their children over without counting wages, hoping that the boys would from an early age follow the opera texts, gongs and drums, dragon lanterns and donkey lanterns across the stage, and would early on be known in the countryside as promising youngsters who could act.

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04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding

During the Jiaqing and Daoguang eras of the Qing dynasty, "high-platform gatherings" (Gaotai Hui) were successively established in Qijie, Tonghai county town, Hexi county town, Sijie and Yangguang (now a town under Tonghai County), and have been transmitted to the present. The project is of great significance for carrying on the fine traditions of the Chinese nation and strengthening community cohesion, and also has research value in folklore studies, art studies and historical studies. Gongsun Xin (official archive record of the associated inheritor): Male, of Han ethnicity, born in October 1949, native of Tonghai County, Yunnan Province. From childhood he was fond of the arts; he followed old village artisans in learning to sing Dian opera and huadeng lantern songs, studied instrumental music, and wrote dramatic librettos and performed them. From the age of 18 he studied high-platform construction under the senior high-platform artisans Yang Shaotang and Yang Lishou, and fully mastered all the techniques of high-platform construction. The high platforms he makes are handsome in form and vivid in image; he is skilled at incorporating historical allusions and dramatic stories, designs character tableaux with care, and is quite exacting about scenery and props. At the same time he is able to make props for folk temple fairs, and can also play and sing to instrumental accompaniment; he is warmly welcomed by the local people. Representative inheritor of the national-level intangible cultural heritage project Raised Platforms (Tonghai High Platform), fourth national batch.

05 · Associated Representative Bearers

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

06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography

Sources

China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)

Read the official ihchina.cn record ↗

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