What is the origin, performance form and artistic characteristics of shell dance in Dongtou County, Zhejiang Province?

how many vicissitudes of the shell dance? On the night of the Lantern Festival this year, Dongtou Island was filled with cheers. Under the guidance of the "cauldron", the dragon dance team, the fishing lantern team and the shell team danced with passion, from the mountain path of the fishing village to the county street. In particular, the style of the shell team has a maritime charm. Back in the mid-195s, a folk dance "Shell Dance", which was excavated by the cultural department of Dongtou County and collected and adapted by folk artists, was performed from the county to the region, from the region to the province and all the way to Beijing, the capital, amid cheers from the audience and dance experts. For a time, rave reviews and awards continued. Today, through the long 5 years of historical dust, we can still feel her impressive style. Shell Dance, which originated from "Ying Huo Ding", is a folk dance developed on the basis of the lantern parade of folk "Ying Huo Ding" activities. It is mainly spread in the village of Dongtou County, which speaks Minnan dialect, with a history of about 2 years. In southern Fujian, especially in Quanzhou, the activity of "welcoming the cauldron" has been circulating for a long time. In Minnan language, "welcome" means to cruise and let people watch; "Ding" is a pot. When local people carry out such folk activities, people beat gongs and drums to patrol, and there must be two people carrying a large iron pot burning firewood at the head of the team, which is the famous "Fire Ding Gong Huo Ding Po" in Quanzhou. By two people dressed as an old man and an old woman, carrying an iron pot with a long bamboo pole, dancing in the wandering spirit team and improvising; A man dressed as a fisherman, followed closely with firewood and dance steps, adding firewood to the iron pot from time to time to make the fire in the pot more prosperous. Its intention is to exorcise evil spirits and dirt, and to pray for good fortune. The ancestors of the residents who speak Minnan in Dongtou moved from Fujian and inherited and developed this custom. Every year during the Lantern Festival, a "Ding Ying Huo" activity is held. From the Spring Festival to the Lantern Festival, it is the fishing season. When the fishing industry is a little better, in order to celebrate the festival, fishermen's large-scale activities, in addition to dragon dancing, are "Ding Ying Huo". This activity is dominated by the fire tripod, or the leader, or behind the house, the firewood in the pot burns "beep" and the fire is booming. In the long queue, there are fish lanterns and shellfish lanterns made according to the shape of fish, shrimp, crab and shellfish, costume figures dressed according to traditional opera stories, and accompanying teams holding colorful flags and carrying Lantern Festival lanterns. When cruising, along the village ao and around the mountain road, whenever there are many people, they swim and dance. Shell lanterns are very popular in the parade. Marine shellfish have different shapes and colorful colors, and folk artists have made them carefully: with thin bamboo strips tied out of the frame, covered with white paper, and then painted with different colors, they have made razor clams, clams, clams, mussels, small conchs and so on, which are lifelike. The performer tied the shell on his back, held the handle in the shell, closed his hands one by one in the music, squatted when he turned, and his steps were broken. The melodious melody of the music, the colorful shell props and the lively and vivid dancing of the human body constitute a harmonious and beautiful dance scene, which is very eye-catching. The large-scale folk cultural activity of "Ying Huo Ding" shows people's joy in celebrating the harvest of fishery production, and entrusts them with a good wish for a mediocre wife and a prosperous life, so it has become an activity that all men, women and children actively participate in. Some villages are out in unison, and some villages are secretly competing. Among them, the shell lamp in Dawangdian Village of Beisha Township was famous in that year. It was in that mid-195s that shell dance, which was root in the mass culture, went from parade to stage, from impromptu performance without plot to dance with distinctive theme. In January 1952, the whole territory of Dongtou was liberated. With social stability, people live and work in peace and contentment, and the demand for cultural life has also increased. County cultural departments give full play to the rich advantages of island folk culture, and focus on the excavation and arrangement of folk dances and folk music. From January, 1955 to December, 1956, the county's folk music and dance and amateur troupe performances in fishing villages were held for three times in a row. A number of outstanding programs, such as folk instrumental music Long Tail, Bangzi Toutong, Ocean Harvest, folk dances such as Fish Lantern Dance, Red Shrimp and Tongue-sole, stood out, and Shell Dance was the best. Shi Shubao is one of the main organizers of Shell Dance. This young folk artist, who was less than 3 years old, was familiar with local folk customs and had the practice of playing folk music. He extracted nutrition from the folklore of fishing villages, such as "the fairy of sea mussels became a man's wife" and "the generation of parasitic crabs", and together with other artists, he refined it several times, making Shell Dance a fairy-tale dance that promotes kindness, praises justice and lashes evil. At that time, Zhan Bozhi, the director of the county cultural center, Yang Jiying, Zheng Deyou and others also did a lot of guidance and assistance. The basic plot of "Shell Dance" is: On a sunny day, a group of seashells danced heartily on the golden beach to prepare for the wedding of the long-lost clam and flower clam. Suddenly, the ferocious crab came, took away and killed the young and weak conch, got into the shell of the snail and mixed in with the shellfish, waiting for an opportunity to be fierce again. Clever elder sister Yan saw through the disguise of the crab and led the shellfish to fight it to the death. The seashells huddled together and fought bravely against the enemy, finally defeating the crabs, and the beach was quiet again. "Shell Dance" is quite innovative in the design of dance vocabulary: it not only retains the traditional "round field" footwork, but also creates new actions such as "jumping away", "swimming away" and "walking sideways" according to the different living habits of shellfish; It not only retains the original figure of squatting with shells on its back, but also designs a new scene of shuzhanman dancing without shells for the needs of stage performance. As for its accompaniment music, a large number of folk music such as "Nezha Walking in the Clouds", "The Emperor of Heaven" and "The Wasp Out of the Hole" are used, which makes the whole dance full of rich marine charm and life breath. In the 199s, Zhejiang Song and Dance Troupe adapted the accompaniment music of Shell Dance into instrumental music, which was melodious and melodious, making people fascinated. Of course, this is another story. From the mid-195s to the early 196s, mass cultural activities in Dongtou flourished. In October, 196, the Dance Studio of Zhejiang Mass Art Museum published an article in the national publication Dance. When reviewing the development of mass dance in the whole province, it mentioned Dongtou three times and cited Shell Dance twice, praising Dongtou as "a red flag for mass dance activities in the province". In the same year, Wenzhou Cultural Center wrote in the article "Flourishing Mass Dance Activities": "Dongtou is an advanced area of mass dance activities in the city ... We hold on to it and learn from it as a model, encouraging all communes to set up ambitions, learn from Dongtou and catch Dongtou." The flower "Shell Dance" was cultivated and opened in the flower garden of the island mass culture under the rain and dew of the party's "Hundred Flowers" policy. Colorful Capital Stage On January 8, 1957, a folk music and dance selection contest was held in Wenzhou. Shell Dance, which just came out of the county gate, became an instant hit, and captivated the audience with vivid images, beautiful dancing and melodious music. On January 11th, the front page of Zhejiang Southern Popular Newspaper published the news: "A general performance was held in the special area, and the shell dance was full of colors", and on the same day, the third edition published a beautiful and touching fairy poem, which introduced this dance in detail in a lyrical style. Soon, as an excellent program in the region, Shell Dance went to Hangzhou to participate in the second folk music and dance performance in the province and won the first prize. On the front page of February 23rd, Zhejiang Southern Popular Newspaper reported the good news: Song and Dance Concert, Shell Dance in Beijing! However, many things happen, and in the program list that the province finally decided to participate in the national performance, Dongtou County only has folk instrumental ensemble "Dragon Head and Dragon Tail", but there is no "Shell Dance". From April 29th to May 5th, 1959, music and dance performances were held in the whole province. Among the 4 programs, only 7 were folk dances. "Shell Dance" was lucky enough to be selected and caused a sensation again after the performance. On May 8th, Zhejiang Daily reported the news of the performance, and at the same time, it published an article on the reflection of the captain of the dance team of Shanghai Experimental Opera House, especially mentioning: "The Shell Dance performed by the Wenzhou Special Zone team vividly implied the struggle between good and evil in human life with the shell life in the ocean ... If you want to ask me what I feel about the performance, in a word, folk art will always be a model for our professional workers to learn." Zhejiang Pictorial published that month also published a large-scale performance photo of Shell Dance. In July of the same year, Dance magazine published three articles under the general title of Song and Dance Concert in Zhejiang Province, one of which was entitled Dance with Marine Characteristics, which made a high evaluation of Shell Dance from the aspects of distinctive theme, concise structure and successful music. Another article takes Shell Dance as an example to illustrate an excellent dance program, which needs to be sorted and processed repeatedly. Shell Dance was once again affirmed. In the eyes of dance experts, and in the eager period of Dongtou people, "Shell Dance" finally reached the stage of literature and art in the capital Beijing. At the end of July, 1959, the report performance of music and dance in eight provinces and autonomous regions sponsored by the Ministry of Culture was held in Beijing. Actors from Yunnan, Guizhou, Guangxi, Zhejiang, Xinjiang, Tibet, Fujian and Anhui performed 56 excellent programs on three channels, and Shell Dance shone brilliantly. Dance magazine reported the performance in September of that year, and published a signed article entitled "Inheritance and Development —— Report on Performance Impression of Eight Provinces and Autonomous Regions". The full text was less than 5, words, but nearly two-fifths of the space was used to comment on Shell Dance, and it was considered that the success of this dance was an example worthy of study by dancers. "Shell Dance" came back with great fame, and has since become a reserved program for literary performances in Dongtou County. In June 196, the People's Liberation Army of China held a joint military exercise in Dongtou, and in January 1962, it celebrated the 1th anniversary of Dongtou's liberation. At the literary evenings of these major events, there was a pretty figure of "Shell Dance". Shell Dance, which survives in heritage protection, is loaded with the accumulation of marine folk culture for more than 2 years and hobbles towards us. Since the mid-195s, she has gone through glory, imprisonment and silence. During this period, as the census results of the seven integrations of folk literature and art, the data of Shell Dance collected by the County Cultural Center was included in the China Folk Dance Integration Wenzhou Volume. In 1997, the Ministry of Culture assigned the compilation of folk dance records as a key project in the Ninth Five-Year Plan of national art science, and Zhejiang Volume of Chinese Dance was compiled and published, among which Shell Dance was listed. In July 1997, Dongtou County held the first "Fisherman's Music" folk customs tourism festival, and Shell Dance was listed as the first choice program. The cultural department of the county overcame difficulties and rearranged it, and performed in the form of square dance, which made her reappear in the past and won the appreciation of tourists. Today, when governments at all levels vigorously advocate the protection of national folk cultural heritage, Shell Dance is lucky. In 23, she was declared by the county as a national folk art protection project in Zhejiang Province. Nowadays, in Dongtou, at some large-scale folk celebrations and literary evenings, you can see the performance of Shell Dance, and the beautiful appearance is not less than that of that year. Protection of "Shell Dance" also protects many folk arts on the island: shell props are made by folk crafts, and their materials range from bamboo sticks to lead wires, from paper paste to cloth tension, from external candle lighting to internal flash devices ... The renewal of people's aesthetic concepts has promoted the development of folk crafts. Dance accompaniment belongs to folk music, and its musical instruments are used from pure folk music to joining western instruments, from only accompanying dance to becoming an independent instrumental ensemble ... The development with the times is of great benefit to sister art.. Protecting Shell Dance also protects the fine tradition of learning and inheriting excellent folk culture. Inspired by the successful experience of Shell Dance, island literary and art workers tried to absorb nutrition from marine folk culture, and adapted and created a number of literary and art works with unique marine characteristics. In terms of music and dance, there are jellyfish dance, shark catching, laundry dance, and conch ringing with full load. More recently, there are dances "Ship Sending Wind" based on fishermen's custom of going out to sea to make wine, dances "Dragon Palace Searching for Treasure" and "Daughter Reef" adapted from marine folklore; There are also songs such as "Fishing Song Duet", "Gambling Ballad" and so on. These programs have achieved good results in provincial and municipal performances.