The Peacock Dance is the most prestigious traditional performance dance among the Dai folk dances in China, which is spread in Ruili, Luxi and Xishuangbanna of Dehong Dai Jingpo Autonomous Prefecture in Yunnan Province, Mengding, Munda, Jinggu, Canyuan and other Dai inhabited areas, of which the Peacock Dance of Ruili in the western part of Yunnan Province (Dai language is "Galaoyong") has the most representativeness.
Legend has it that more than a thousand years ago, the Dai leader called Ma Li Jie number to imitate the beautiful posture of the peacock and learn to dance, and then processed and molded by successive generations of folk artists, and passed down, forming the peacock dance.
① Peacock Dance originThe Dai have a long history, from the 1st century AD, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty developed the Western
Traditional Peacock Dance after the South and the mainland in the economic and cultural aspects have been to maintain contacts. In the Eastern Han Dynasty, the Dai chief repeatedly sent emissaries to perform music and dance, magic, acrobatics rate to Luoyang to dedicate. It can be seen that the music and dance culture of the Dai people had a high level as early as two thousand years ago.
In the minds of the Dai people, the peacock is a symbol of happiness and good fortune. Not only do many people keep peacocks in their homes, but they also regard the peacock as a symbol of goodness, wisdom, beauty, good fortune and happiness. Among the many kinds of Dai dances, the peacock dance is one of the most favorite and familiar dances, and also one of the dances with the greatest changes and development.
The Peacock Dance of Dai folk tradition has a long history and has been incorporated into the rituals of religion. The Peacock Dance is the favorite folk dance of the Dai people, and in the dam area where the Dai people live, there are almost monthly "pendulum" (festivals), and there are songs and dances every year. In the Dai's annual "Water Festival", "closed door festival", "Open Door Festival", "Catch the pendulum" and other folk festivals, as long as it is a happy place, the Dai people will gather together, ringing the gongs, playing the drums, jumping up the beautiful posture of the "Peacock Dance", singing and dancing in the sound of the harvest of the festive atmosphere and the beautiful scene of national unity.
② Peacock Dance regional distributionPeacock Dance distribution of the wider region, the upper Ali three, the central Weizang four wings, the lower Duo Gan Si six Gang, have expressed the peacock folk dance. Due to the geographical environment, customs and habits of different places, the peacock dance performance form, style characteristics, skill difficulty, lyrics to the general idea, music style also has differences. In order to illustrate the differences between peacock dances around the world, several different peacock dances are borrowed for comparison and study.
The Peacock Dance, known as "Ga Luochong" and "Ga Nan Luo" in Dai language, can be performed as a solo dance, a duo dance or a trio dance. It is the favorite square performance dance of the Dai people with ancient tradition, which is widely spread in the Dai settlement. Among them, especially the peacock dance of Ruili is more wonderful and popular, and almost every village has a master of peacock dance, and there are even professional artists who make a living by dancing peacock dance. This peacock dance, mainly imitating the peacock running down the mountain, strolling through the forest, drinking water, chasing and playing, as well as dragging the wings, sun wings, wings, open screen, flying and other actions. These actions have a strict program and requirements: each action before the starting style, finished after the closing style; there are fixed steps, positional charts and fixed combinations of actions;
Each combination of actions and a fixed drum accompaniment. Ruili Dai Peacock Dance is mainly a single dance, and there is also a double peacock dance. The dancers are mostly male. Shelf peacock dance dance vocabulary is particularly rich, there are "running down the mountain", "forest peeping", "walking in the forest", "shaking wings ", "pointing to the water" and other exquisite simulation of the peacock demeanor of the action.
③ Peacock Dance DevelopmentTraditional Peacock Dance, in the past by men wearing a gold helmet, mask, wearing a support frame covered with peacock feathers performance attire, in the elephant foot drums, gongs, cymbals and other musical instruments accompanied by the dance. The dance has a strict program that includes a rich variety of symbolic hand shapes and a variety of jumping and turning postures, accompanied by a beautiful "three bends" body shape that portrays the peacock's "peeping in the forest," "walking in the forest," "drinking from the spring and playing in the water," "chasing and playing," and other demeanor and natural scenarios. Although the traditional peacock dance performed by men is more robust and upright than feminine, the smooth dance posture and the beautiful shape of the simulated peacock tend to mesmerize the viewers, ignoring the gender of the performers.
The important musical instrument accompanying the Dai dance is the "elephant-footed drum", and in the Dai ethnic group, from 3- and 4-year-old children to the elderly, there is no one who can't play the elephant-footed drum. The senior player of the drum is not only a musician who plays the drum, but also an excellent dancer.
Because the performance level of the Dai dancers is closely related to the drummer's performance. The dancers and musicians usually do not practice together before the dance, and rely entirely on each other's feelings for tacit cooperation and performance. The drummer, being familiar with the dance, chooses and changes the rhythm and tempo of the drums according to the level of the dancers, and even guides the dancers to show their difficult skills. On appropriate occasions, musicians will also participate in the dance, with the fingers and palms of the hands, as well as fists, elbows, head, feet parts, beating a variety of imitation of the natural world of a variety of acoustic drums skilled, a hammer down, the drums of the sound of the length of the Chinese blouse can be unbuttoned all the loops, and then hit the hammer, and then button loops all the buttons on. The musicians sometimes span about 80 centimeters long small elephant-footed drums and dance while beating the drums. Their dance is flexible, cheerful, strong jumping, is a young man to show the level of personal drumming and skill in an excellent form.