Honghu Lake, this revolutionary hot spot, was once one of the centers of the rural land revolution in the country, which gave birth to countless revolutionary legends and glorious feats, and composed a song of immortal heroes.
As we all know, during the period of the Land Revolutionary War, the revolutionary base area of western Hunan-Erkhine was one of the major bases in the country created through armed struggle centered on Honghu Lake under the leadership of the party organizations of western Hunan-Erkhine represented by He Long, Zhou Yiqun, and Duan Dechang, etc. Qujiawan in Honghu Lake was the capital of western Hunan-Erkhine Soviet Union in the heyday of the revolution. The revolutionary base area in western Hunan-Erkhine, centered on Honghu, made an important contribution to the accumulation and development of Chinese revolutionary power by cooperating with the revolutionary struggle in various regions. Under the correct leadership of the ****-producers headed by He Long and Zhou Yiqun, the guerrilla war in the Honghu area persisted for several years, and later joined with the Red Sixth Army Corps to form the Red Second Front Army, one of the three main forces of the Red Army, and accumulated valuable experience for the subsequent revolutionary wars. Mao Zedong highly praised, "The Honghu guerrilla war in the Red Army era persisted for several years, all evidence that the river, lake, harbor and branch areas were able to develop a guerrilla war and establish a base."
In order to commemorate this legendary revolutionary era, all levels of government in Hubei province have attached great importance to the discovery and collection of these local materials. 1952, Hubei province, prefecture and county cultural troupes After the integration of the three levels of cultural troupes, the construction of an opera troupe of about 70 people, named Hubei Provincial Local Opera Troupe. This troupe gathered many outstanding musical talents from all over the country, including Zhang Jing'an, the lyricist and composer of "Waves of the Honghu Lake", and Uncle Ouyang Qian. Zhang Jing'an was born in March 1925 in Macheng and graduated from the Music Department of the National Normal University of Hubei Province in 1949, with high musical talent; Ouyang Qian'shu was born in December 1926, a native of Shuangfeng, Hunan Province, who grew up with a strong musical influence from his family, and graduated from the Shanghai Conservatory of Music at the beginning of the liberation period. They had worked together on about 20 new operas before composing the opera "Red Guard of Honghu Lake" and the libretto for "Waves of Honghu Lake". These young opera troupe members, out of their immense love for the new China and admiration for the Honghu Revolution, in the early 1950s, they actively penetrated into the masses, mobilized the masses, and extensively collected the revolutionary struggle ballads and stories of Honghu, as well as Honghu's fishermen's songs and folk tunes, laying a solid foundation for the creation of "Red Guard of the Honghu Lake".
In 1958, the Hubei Provincial Opera Troupe decided to put the collected moving stories of bravery on the stage to commemorate this revolutionary history in the form of folk music, and as a program to be presented in Beijing for the 10th anniversary of the National Day. Honghu Red Guard" was composed by the Hubei Provincial Opera Troupe with Mei Shaoshan, Yang Huijun, Zhang Jing'an, Ouyang Qianshu and Zhu Benhe as the backbone of the troupe, and the music was composed by Zhang Jing'an and Ouyang Qianshu. They for the creation of "Honghu Red Guards" again to Honghu field interviews, respectively, held a forum of the revolutionary elderly and literary activists, to seek advice, modify the script, is the winter of the opera script is completed.
The opera "Honghu Red Guards" is set against the backdrop of the Second Domestic Revolutionary War, depicting the people's masses under the leadership of the Chinese ****production party, and landlords and bullies, reactionary forces of the fight to the death. The main content is that around 1930, after the Shinyang County Committee in Hubei withdrew the Red Guard, the head of the local White Polar Society, Peng Batian, attempted to make a comeback with the support of the Kuomintang forces, and the Red Guard continued to attack the enemy under the leadership of the secretary of the township party branch, Han Ying, and the captain, Liu Bao, who was courageous and resourceful with his gun. Liu Geng, who is brave but not resourceful, shoots a secret agent and exposes his target. Han Ying was arrested together with Wang Jinbiao, the sub-captain of the unit, while covering the retreat of the unit. Later, Wang Jinbiao mutinied, but Han Ying would rather die than give up. The enemy brought Han Ying's mother to persuade her to surrender, and she encouraged each other to remain steadfast. The enemy released the traitor Wang Jinbiao and tried to lure the Red Guard into an ambush. At this time, Peng Batian's adjutant reveals his true identity as a member of the underground party and covers Han Ying's escape with his own life. Han Ying returned to the Red Guard and shot the traitor, and cooperated with the Red Army in the battle to eliminate Peng Batian.
This opera is very popular among people from all walks of life, and many of its cantatas have been widely circulated throughout the country. The duet between Han Ying and Qiu Ju is one of the most widely circulated cantatas in the opera, and it is an independent interlude in the opera "The Red Guards of the Honghu Lake," one of the six operas -- a song after the Red Guards won the battle. Independence Interlude. The music of this song was composed by drawing the most vital musical repertoire from Hubei Tianshin Flower Drum Opera and the folk music of Tianmen, Shinyang (the county to which Honghu originally belonged), and Qianjiang, with the song "Ballad of the Xianghe River," popular in the Jianghan Plain in the 1950s, and the Tianmen ditty "Moon Watching Lang" becoming its main musical materials. In "Ballad of the Xianghe River," the song is about the people's grief over the floods. The lyrics read, "The water of the Xianghe River is yellow, yellow, yellow, yellow, yellow, yellow, yellow, yellow, yellow, yellow, yellow, yellow. Every year the floods break the dike, and many people suffer." It describes the pre-liberation period, when the Nationalist Party's corrupt rule left the Xianghe River's dikes unrepaired for years, resulting in flooding that victimized the common people. Zhang Jing'an was touched by the melody of this ballad after collecting this material, and used it freely in the opera when composing the song. At that time, he wrote the melody and the first eight lines of the lyrics of this piece of music in one go, while the latter part of the lyrics and the melody of the repetitive part of the song were continued by Uncle Ouyang Qian.