The detailed knowledge about Ansai Waist Drum
Posted by ugfanfan on November 28th, 2014
According to the book The Classic of Mountains and Rivers, the drum is the product of the war between Yellow Emperor and ChiYou, after which it develops into an indispensable equipment to inspire the morale and deter the enemy. For easy to carry, people copy the shape of the drum and make it into a tiny drum which can be tied on the waist. After the Qin dynasty, Ansai has been a garrison place and military strategist battleground for the next ages. Like the knife, bows and arrows, the drum is also regarded as an equipment of the combat forces. Once met a sudden strike, the drum can be used for giving an alarm and sending messages; when two armies were fighting with each other, the drum can be used for inspiring the morale. When lost the battle, the drum can be used for sending emergency message; when defeat the enemy, the drum can be used for joy and celebration. With the development of history, the military usage of the waist drum gradually disappeared, only used as the musical instrument for dancing and singing. In Song dynasty, the Yangko and Waist drum became very prosperous and finally developed into a recreational activity among the folk. In 1980s, the performance of Waist drum started to combine with the Yangko, Zhuanjiuqu, Wucaichou, Paozuma , Shuashanzi, Caogaoqiao and Bawangbian. During the long-term process of performance, the Ansai waist drum always made innovation in its performance style; gradually combined with dancing, martial arts, gymnastics, percussion, wind music and folk song, formed a folk art with unique style in all ages of the Loess culture. In the year 1996, November, Ansai was named as "the home of waist drum" by the Ministry of Culture and in November, 2003, the trademark of Ansai waist drum successfully registered.
Ansai waist drum can be divided into Wen drum and Wu drum (means it can be played in a more gentle way and a wild way ) according to its playing way; from the performance form it can be divided into Road drum(performed on the road), Site drum (performed at the site) and Stage drum (performed on the stage).
The Wen drum mainly focused on twisting rather than beating. When comes to the climax of the performance, the person who plays drum will invert the drum sticks softly and lively with fine and smooth action. Twisting and dancing combined with each other, with the joyful sound of Suona, the player expresses his delightful feeling with his fully-strength, which makes the audience feel relaxed and happy.
The Wu drum mainly focused on beating and kicking rather than twisting, it is difficult to do and requires vigorous activity, especially requires the orderliness of movement and sense of rhythm. A man's skill of playing the waist drum is mainly measured by how he plays the Wu drum. The artistry of Ansai waist drum is mainly reflected in the Wu drum. From the overall point of view, formation changes must be consistent with each other, reaching the standard of faster spreading and faster gathering, quick in change, vigorous and powerful, natural and fluent, lively and smoothly, strong and gentle movement.
Road drum is also called Walking drum or Street drum. Walking drum is a performance form of the processing waist drum line, which mainly focused on walking rather than play the drum, with clear and easy movement , basically includes hands bound on the waist, performing leapfrog, maypoe, pour kicking and chicken pecking the food. The formation includes one person crosses the street, double person cross the street, Double-Helix, and date pit disorderly flowering, etc. Sometimes, according to the needs, it also has transient fixed performance but usually not last for a long time.
Site drum is a performance form which being played in a specify place or on the square, is the main part of Ansai waist drum's performance. This kind of performance has rich contents and various performance forms, before the performance, people always first Tichangzi (a kind of performance form of which people dance and play the drum in a circle to drive the crowded people back, thus they can get an empty area for their performance). According to the size of the perform area, performers usually dance or play the drum in a circle to drive the crowded audience back and get an empty area for the following performance. After the area was prepared, the dance shower leads the waist drum line from all direction processing into the performance area. First, they should worship the audience around and then start the formal performance. At this moment, all the first class drummers are all in order and start their changeable performance, brightly and bravely.
The stage drum is a kind of performance form of which only a few drummers get together and perform on the stage. This performance form needs 8 to 12 people and it requires high skills and should be done in a short time.
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