Qiangmu
01 · Historical Records
Lakang Jiacham had been interrupted for 30 years; after the Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee of the Communist Party of China was convened, and with the care and attention of the Party and the government, this unique folk song-and-dance was transmitted and developed once again. According to the oral accounts of the monasteries around Lakang town and to local materials, Lakang Jiacham was handed down from monastery cham to the folk, and once the dancers came to be undertaken by lay people a unique "lay people's cham" tradition took shape. Lakang town lies on the southern border of Lhozhag County adjoining Bhutan; the border trade exchange meeting held on the fifteenth day of the twelfth Tibetan month, also called the "Lakang Border Trade Meeting", has the Jiacham as the fixed opening-night programme. Jiacham had been interrupted for 30 years; after the Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee, and with the care and attention of the Party and the government, this unique folk song-and-dance was transmitted and developed once again, and performance resumed in 1985.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
Jiacham is a cham of the Dagpo Kagyu school of Tibetan Buddhism performed by lay people (the common folk) of Lakang town, Lhozhag County, Shannan Prefecture, Tibet. The performance of Lakang Jiacham marks the opening of the Lakang Border Trade Exchange Meeting. The dancers of Jiacham are all local people of Lakang town; they do not leave their farming behind to train and do not live in the monastery, working in agriculture and herding in ordinary life and rehearsing and performing intensively during the festival period. The performance is accompanied above all by drums and cymbals; since performances resumed, Baima Qunjiu has served as the organizer and as drum-and-cymbal player, responsible for summoning the dancers, teaching the movements and controlling the rhythm of the whole music-and-dance performance. The complete performance inherits the ritual procedures of the Dagpo Kagyu school cham: the masks, costumes and steps may not be altered at will, and the work is performed only at fixed times and places.
Opening the border-trade fair
Each year on the fifteenth day of the twelfth Tibetan month the dance opens the Lhakang border-trade fair in Lhozhag county.
A lay-performed Kagyu cham
Jia cham is a Kagyu Buddhist cham performed by lay people of Lhakang town rather than by monks.
Organizer and cymbal player
Drum and cymbal drive the dance; after the 1985 revival Pema Chojor served as organizer and cymbal player, setting the rhythm for the whole performance.
Revival after three decades
After thirty years of interruption the lay cham was revived in 1985 and has been performed ever since.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
Lakang Jiacham is a folk song-and-dance with a distinctive artistic style and strong regional characteristics; it is a product of the combination of Tibetan folk culture and religious culture, and also an important component of the intangible cultural heritage of the Chinese nation. Every year on the fifteenth day of the twelfth Tibetan month, when the traditional border trade exchange meeting is held in Lakang town, Lhozhag County, Lakang Jiacham becomes the opening-night programme of the fair, and is also one of the folk art programmes most welcome to the local masses and to merchants coming from outside. In terms of school affiliation, Lakang Jiacham belongs to the cham system of Kagyu school monasteries, yet it is performed by lay people of Lakang town; unlike the monk chams of the cham projects such as the Drigung Gar Cham, the A Cham of Qude Temple and the Samye Monastery cham, it differs in the subject of transmission, in performance time and in occasion. It is the representative of the lay people's branch among Tibetan chams.
Other submitting regions for the same item: Shigatse Zhashenlunbusiqiangmu · Qiangmu · Qiangmu · Qiangmu · Qiangmu · Qiangmu · Qiangmu.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
Baima Qunjiu (record from the official inheritor file): Male, Tibetan, born April 1941, native of Lhozhag County, Tibet Autonomous Region. At the age of 14 he began to learn the performance of Lakang Jiacham from Gongga Qunpei, a cham inheritor; he came to understand the performance forms, artistic characteristics and historical origins of Lakang Jiacham (the lay people's cham), and mastered its performance content and all its dance movement techniques, attaining a high degree of accomplishment in performance. After Lakang Jiacham resumed performance in 1985, he served as the organizer and as drum-and-cymbal player. Representative inheritor of cham (Lakang Jiacham) among the fourth batch of national-level intangible cultural heritage projects. He has been an inheritor of the lay people's cham from 1985 to the present. He promptly passed on the Jiacham performance skills he had mastered to younger artists such as Zhandui, training a stable team of inheritors and safeguarding the transmission and practice of Lakang Jiacham. Since Lakang Jiacham was restored in 1985, it has been performed as scheduled every year with the border trade meeting, becoming a folk scene in which the local people and visiting merchants take part together. Baima Qunjiu, representative inheritor of the fourth national-level batch, passed the skills he had mastered on to younger artists such as Zhandui and trained a stable team of inheritors, enabling the dance segments and the drum-and-cymbal procedures of this lay people's cham to continue.
05 · Associated Representative Bearers
Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:
- Lama Ciren 02-0377
- Lama Mima 02-0378
- Baimaqunjiu 04-1565
- Tudanqunpei 04-1566
- Zhaxi 05-2232
- Ciyang 05-2233
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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