Zongshan Dance
01 · Historical Records
The Palm-Leaf Fan Dance has a long history, and most of its dance movements imitate the forms of birds and beasts met with by the Hani ancestors on the road of their migration, as well as imitating the states of their daily production and life. The Palm-Leaf Fan Dance reflects the Hani people’s memory of the migration history of their ancestors and preserves the traditional genetic elements of Hani culture.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
The Palm-Leaf Fan Dance is a traditional Hani dance transmitted in the Hani villages at the junction of Honghe County and Yuanjiang County, Yunnan Province. At the traditional Hani festivals and life-cycle rituals such as the Angmatu (ancestor-sacrifice festival), the Kuzhaza (Sixth Month Festival) and the Zalete (Tenth Month Festival), people hold grand feasts and sing and dance, each of them holding a palm leaf in each hand as they dance the Palm-Leaf Fan Dance. The Palm-Leaf Fan Dance has more than sixty sequences. Before the dance, the elder always leads the dance and chants ancient songs and blessings. The participants form a circle freely, with the men inside and the women outside, the elder dancing first and the younger generation following; when the dance reaches its fullest pitch, people vie to enter the circle to display their dancing skill. The movements imitate such things as the silver pheasant spreading its wings, the silver pheasant drinking water, bees and butterflies gathering flowers, the old bear walking, cocks fighting, monkeys breaking off ears of corn and eagles beating their wings, as well as certain postures of people’s production and labour. The accompanying instruments of the Palm-Leaf Fan Dance are mainly the cowhide drum, the chao, cymbals, the suona and the sanxian. The Palm-Leaf Fan Dance is a song-and-dance art that integrates singing, dancing, music and zoomorphic performance in one, is distinctive in character, and has high traditional cultural value.
The festival occasions
Danced at the ancestor festival, the June festival and the October festival, and at rites of passage, when people feast, sing and dance holding a palm leaf in each hand.
Imitative routines from birds and beasts
More than sixty routines imitate the birds and beasts met on the ancestors' migration, from silver pheasants and bees to bears, fighting cocks and eagles.
The elder leading with an old song
An elder opens with an old song and blessing, then men form the inner and women the outer circle, with the young following and later stepping in to show off their skills.
The accompanying instruments
Backed by buffalo-hide drums, gongs, cymbals, suona and sanxian, the dance fuses song, movement and music in one Hani art form.
Long Zhengfu and the county troupe
Long Zhengfu, born in 1943, toured Beijing, Tianjin and Shanghai with the county Hani folk art troupe and has trained a number of fully fledged disciples.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
The Palm-Leaf Fan Dance has its main place of transmission in Yuanjiang Hani, Yi and Dai Autonomous County, Yunnan Province, concentrated in the Hani-inhabited townships of Yangjie and Nannuo, and extending to the Hani villages along the border with Honghe County. Hani villages of the same branch also dance the Palm-Leaf Fan Dance at festivals such as the Angmatu, the Kuzhaza and the Zalete, as well as at life-cycle rituals including weddings and funerals; exchange between the dance troupes of neighbouring villages is carried on through the visiting of kinsmen, and whoever has more sequences and steadier steps is pushed to the middle of the circle to show them off. Because the Hani traditionally had no script in common use, the names of the sequences and the ancient songs are all transmitted orally by the elders, and the repertoire mastered by each village is not entirely the same; only after the elder has led the dance and chanted the ancient songs and blessings do the participants form the circle freely, with the men inside and the women outside following in turn. The county lies in the Yuanjiang river valley, and the Hani villages are for the most part distributed on the middle slopes of the mountains, so the circle of the Palm-Leaf Fan Dance is often danced in the village threshing floor and at the head of the fields.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
Long Zhengfu (official archive record of the associated inheritor): Male, of Hani ethnicity, born in September 1943, native of Yuanjiang Hani, Yi and Dai Autonomous County, Yunnan Province. He has performed in Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai and other places with the Hani folk art troupe of Yuanjiang County, and was widely praised. Representative inheritor of the Palm-Leaf Fan Dance, a national-level intangible cultural heritage project in the fourth national batch. So that the Hani Palm-Leaf Fan Dance may be handed down and developed, he has persisted in teaching disciples, and a number of his apprentices have now completed their training.
05 · Associated Representative Bearers
Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:
- Long Zhengfu 04-1586
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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