Pingjiang Festive Lantern Opera
Name: Pingjiang Festive Lantern Opera
No.: Άτ-39
Category: Traditional Drama
Year of Application: 2006
Applicant: Pingjiang County, Yueyang City
Level: Provincial
Pingjiang Festive Lantern Opera, also called "Lantern Opera", is prevalent in Pingjiang County and east Liuyang City. The stage language of Pingjiang Festive Lantern Opera is based on the combination of Pingjiang dialect and the official language of Changsha.
The performing of Lantern Opera integrates the essence of folk dance, martial arts and storytelling. It requires singing and dancing at the same time and involves coordinated movement of the mouth, eyes, body and steps. There are over 100 traditional repertoires of the Lantern Opera.
It is a custom in Pingjiang that a Lantern Opera troupe, composed of amateur artists, boxers and gong and drum players, would give performances from village to village from the 10th through the 15th of the first lunar month (Lantern Festival). The performance starts with martial arts given by boxers, then a female role and a clown role or two females and two clown roles dance and sing a couple of songs. During the procedure of developing into an opera, it also experienced the stage of two-role and three-role operetta before it formed its own dominate tune----the "Chuan" tune and the "Gong" tune.