Nanzha Folk Songs
01 · Historical Records
Nanzha lies on the west bank of the Grand Canal in northern Jiangsu; because of the adjustment of administrative divisions in 2018 it now belongs to Caoyun Town of Huai'an District. Nanzha folk songs have a long and far-reaching source, originating in the Tang dynasty, when a Tang poet wrote the lines “Over Baimahu in the autumn sunlight … a tune of southern music is heard here”; they flourished in the late Qing and the Republic of China period, and the Qing gazetteer of Anyi County records “a thousand songs on the Gao and Bao platforms, the best flavour of all at Xinhetou”. Nanzha folk songs display a rich state of local folk custom and culture, and provide vivid material for the study of regional ethnic history, of the history of folklore, of the history of institutional change and of cultural history.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
They have both the flowing style of the waters of the Grand Canal and the gentleness and lingering charm of the still waters of Baimahu; their modes are varied, with performance that carries feeling, with truth expressed directly, and with oblique indirection. Their lyrics are mostly in spoken language, fluent and concise, and employ many rhetorical devices such as analogy and comparison; they have artistic conception and lingering flavour, and are soaked in the life interests of the local farmers and fishermen. Their forms of performance are free: there is solo, there is antiphonal, there is one singer with a chorus, and there is group chorus. Xinhetou is where the Nanzha market town on the shore of Baimahu stands; in the early years it was the point at which the New River entered the lake, where farmers, fishermen, boatmen and traders all gathered, where market trade was flourishing, and where country people from dozens of li away came to the fair; the open-air folk song performances in the street drew large crowds, and men, women, old and young singing folk songs created a boom.
Da Tiao Yu'er San Chi San
The principal repertory of Nanzha folk songs comprises the labour songs of the “Jie'er Xiang'er” three-and-a-half-line and five-and-a-half-line series, local love songs and local ditties, fishing songs and fishing ditties such as “Da Tiao Yu'er San Chi San”, and children's songs and nursery rhymes such as “Cradle Song”; it is a comprehensive traditional regional folk song genre.
Cradle Song
The principal repertory of Nanzha folk songs comprises the labour songs of the “Jie'er Xiang'er” three-and-a-half-line and five-and-a-half-line series, local love songs and local ditties, fishing songs and fishing ditties such as “Da Tiao Yu'er San Chi San”, and children's songs and nursery rhymes such as “Cradle Song”; it is a comprehensive traditional regional folk song genre.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
Among the Nanzha folk songs, those on the theme of the Grand Canal — songs of the canal boatmen's work-song type, for example — are sung mainly along the line of the west bank of the canal; labour ditties such as the rice-transplanting drum songs of the “Jie'er Xiang'er” series are current mainly in the wetland paddy areas; and fishing songs and fishing ditties are distributed mainly in the fishing and production working area of Baimahu. The principal repertory of Nanzha folk songs comprises the labour songs of the “Jie'er Xiang'er” three-and-a-half-line and five-and-a-half-line series, local love songs and local ditties, fishing songs and fishing ditties such as “Da Tiao Yu'er San Chi San”, and children's songs and nursery rhymes such as “Cradle Song”; it is a comprehensive traditional regional folk song genre.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
Nanzha folk songs are traditional folk songs mainly current in Nanzha Town of Huai'an District, Huai'an City, Jiangsu Province; in the course of transmission they have gradually spread to the lake and waterway region within a hundred li around Baimahu. Some local singers can still improvise to the scene, so that the transmission of the folk songs keeps a lasting and ever-fresh artistic effect. At present twenty percent of the local elderly can sing several folk songs, and young and middle-aged folk singers take a keen interest in singing local folk songs, which plays a positive part in the living transmission of Nanzha folk songs. The item depends above all on family and master-apprentice transmission. In the core area many families, such as the Jin, the Shao and the Yang, have clearly documented lines of transmission running to more than three generations. It is a living fossil of Nanzha folk music and has provided the local opera genre Huaiju with its source music and storybook material; it has a fairly high historical, cultural and artistic value.
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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