Quanzhou Paixiong Dance
01 · Historical Records
In southern Minnan the chest-patting dance is also called "beating seven sounds", taking its name from the fact that the palms strike the chest in succession — the front of the chest, the left and right sides of the chest, the two ribs and the two legs — making seven sounds in all. Quanzhou lies in the region where the ancient Minyue people settled; dancers wear a straw hoop on the head decorated with a snake shape, and scholars generally hold that it preserves vestiges of the snake-totem sacrificial rites of the Minyue. In former times, whenever Quanzhou held its god-welcoming processions and its Lantern Festival street parades, chest-patting dance teams went out with the array leaders and danced barefoot and bare-armed in the open in front of the temple and in the middle of the street, leaping and soaring.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
The chest-patting dance is fairly simple in form; one or two people can dance it freely at any time and any place. Traditionally the dancers of the chest-patting dance are men who wear a straw hoop on the head, bare the upper body and go barefoot. Their movements consist chiefly of striking, clapping, pinching and stamping, tending towards a single rhythm, concentrated on the chest, elbows, legs and palms; the basic carriage is one of drawn-in waist and thrust-out chest, the whole body leaping, supplemented by vigorous squatting steps and contented head-shaking, forming a style that is bold, archaic, humorous and ardent. The basic movement of the chest-patting dance is "beating seven sounds": the two hands first clap together once in front of the chest, then strike the left and right sides of the chest in turn, the inner sides of the arms clamp and beat the left and right ribs in turn, and the hands then strike the left and right legs in turn, making seven sounds in all, exactly seven beats in length. At the same time the dancer leaps rhythmically together with the squatting crotch step of the feet, the body swaying to the left and right, accompanied by head-shaking, producing a distinctive swaying dynamic that makes the dance easygoing and natural, revealing a nimble and light, humorous and open character; it is repeated in this cycle for continuous performance. "Beating seven sounds" represents most strikingly the basic dynamic and the stylistic features of the chest-patting dance. Today's dance workers have supplied music for the chest-patting dance, making the performance scene ardent and joyous and the movement orderly, and "beating seven sounds" has become "beating eight sounds" (that is, the two hands clap together twice in front of the chest); this has developed the basic movement of the chest-patting dance and formed distinctive stylistic characteristics. The snake-shaped head ornament on the straw hoop worn by chest-patting dancers preserves the vestiges of the snake-totem worship of the indigenous Minyue people of the Qin and Han periods, and its form of performance also preserves vestiges of the primitive dance of the ancient Minyue people.
Da Qi Xiang (seven beats)
The core routine: one clap before the chest, then slaps to chest, ribs and legs for seven beats, danced with squatting jumps and a trembling head.
The straw hoop and snake ornament
Dancers wear a straw hoop topped with a snake figure, a survival of the ancient Minyue serpent totem.
The lotus-lament scene of the Liyuan play
The Liyuan play Zheng Yuanhe keeps a beggar's chest-slapping 'lotus lament', showing the dance had entered southern drama by Song-Yuan times.
Chest-slapping to the Nanyin tune
Village troupes dance to the Nanyin piece San Qian Liang Jin, matching body percussion to the melody.
Spread through Fuqiao and Jiangnan
Beyond the city of Quanzhou the dance is common in Fuqiao, Jiangnan and Kinmen, performed by as few as one or two dancers.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
The chest-patting dance is one of the most representative folk dances in Fujian Province, and is mainly current in the Fuqiao and Jiangnan areas of southern Minnan as well as in Quanzhou, Kinmen and other places. The internal dynamic of the chest-patting dance is extremely similar to that of the Tujia dance "meat-linked sounds"; viewed from the standpoint of the distribution of dance types, it stands in a close relationship of shared origins with the dances of southern minorities such as the Li and the Gaoshan peoples.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
The ancient Quanzhou theatrical genre of Liyuan opera preserves in Zheng Yuan and Xu the episode of beggars patting their chests, and the present folk chest-patting dance again uses and preserves the Quanzhou nanyin piece Three Thousand Taels of Gold; this cultural transmission relationship is itself highly valuable for research. Qiu Jianying (official archival record of the associated representative inheritor): Male, Han nationality, born in September 1931, native of Quanzhou City, Fujian Province. He learned the art of the chest-patting dance from folk artists from childhood on, and while inheriting the traditional technique he also drew widely on related sister arts of the folk, forming his own characteristic style of performance. He has been devoted to the transmission and promotion of the chest-patting dance, and his personal biography has been included in books such as Chinese Dance and Contemporary Chinese Cultural Artists. Representative inheritor of the Quanzhou chest-patting dance, a national-level intangible cultural heritage project in the third national-level batch. He takes an active part in all kinds of performance activities, and has won such awards as the Excellent Performance Award at the Tianjin Cultural Square Arts Festival of China. In 1995 the Chinese Dancers Association awarded him the title of "a veteran artist with more than thirty years of professional experience", and in 1999 the Fujian Provincial Dancers Association awarded him the Fujian provincial title of "a veteran artist with fifty years of experience in dance work". Guo Jinsuo (official archival record of the associated representative inheritor): Male, Han nationality, born in October 1940, native of Nan'an City, Quanzhou, Fujian Province. As a child he followed the folk artist Guo Shankui to learn the Quanzhou chest-patting dance, and afterwards studied systematically with a number of other folk dance artists. In his performance of the Quanzhou chest-patting dance, "beating seven sounds" is the basic movement, combined with leaps of the feet and shaking of the head, plus characteristic movements created on the spur of the moment, which makes the dance easygoing and natural and gives it a nimble, humorous, bold and ardent style. His performances have toured the country as a featured art project of Fujian, and he has recorded programmes for a number of film and television media outlets, expanding the influence of the Quanzhou chest-patting dance. Representative inheritor of the Quanzhou chest-patting dance, a national-level intangible cultural heritage project in the fourth national-level batch. For many years he has been devoted to cultivating successors for the Quanzhou chest-patting dance, and his footsteps have covered Fujian, Hong Kong, Taiwan and other regions.
05 · Associated Representative Bearers
Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:
- Qiu Jianying 03-0917
- Guo Jinsuo 04-1562
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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