During his wanderings he sings eight songs and is finally able to avenge his father’s fate. The youth, in a white mourning costume, wanders a long way over the hills and through the valleys in search for the killer tiger. It is about a youth whose father was killed by a tiger. From Central Asia or even from India originates a dance play called Botou (Po-t’ou) or Head for head. Finally, however, he is punished for his misbehaviour. The husband is a drunkard, who beats his poor wife. Later, in the Tang (T’ang) (618–907) period the play also found its way to Japan.Ī play called Tayao niang (t’a-yao niang) or The Dancing, Singing Wife comes from the 6 th century AD and is a story about domestic violence. A play called Daimian (tai-mien) or Mask tells about a prince whose features were so soft that he was obliged to wear a terrifying mask in battle in order to scare the enemy.
The chorus described the action which was enacted by dancer-actors. The Early PlaysĮarly dramas combined mime, stylised movement and a chorus. These female statuettes seem to indicate that the aesthetics of female dances in China, which is dominated still today by linear beauty created by sleeves, ribbons and scarves undulating in the air, has an extensive history indeed. They show mime actors, acrobats, jugglers, musicians, sometimes even whole orchestras, and, of course, dancing girls with their flying sleeves. Contemporaneous terracotta tomb statuettes include hundreds of lively depictions of different kinds of performers. Miettinenīesides the textual sources, there exists a great deal of visual evidence of early theatrical forms. The Tang-dynasty tomb terracotta statues give much information about the history of dance. Their dances may have been the predecessors of later opera scenes, in which female characters elegantly operate their extra long white silk sleeves, the so-called “water sleeves”. They also featured dancing girls wearing dresses with long, fluttering silk sleeves. They were kinds of variety shows featuring mimes, jugglers, magicians, acrobats, song, musical recitals, and martial art demonstrations.
Baixi or “A Hundred Entertainments”īefore the beginning of our era it was customary at the court and at public festivities to organise grand-scale spectacles called baixi (pai-shi) or a hundred entertainments or hundred games circus. It seems most probable that the early martial art systems formed the basis from which the rich tradition of Chinese martial operas and their acrobatic fighting scenes as well as the 20 th century gongfu (kung-fu) movies later developed. Martial art demonstrations or shows were popular and, as elsewhere in Asia, in China, too, many of the movements employed by dances originated from the martial art techniques. Besides religious rituals, there were less ceremonial types of performances, such as comic numbers performed by clowns and dwarfs as well as displays of acrobatic skills. They were divided into two groups: wu dances performed by men and xi (hsi) dances performed by women. The so-called chorus dances were popular during the Zhou (Chou) dynasty (c. In fact, animal movements still form an integral part of many martial art, dance and theatre traditions today. As has been already discussed on several occasions, the dances imitating animals and employing the so-called “animal movements” have been common in most cultures.
1766–1066 BC) hunting dances as well as dances imitating animals were performed. It is known that during the Shang dynasty (c. The Monkey King is the beloved anarchist from many Chinese operas Jukka O.
0 kommentar(er)
