In September 1950, the Hunan Provincial Xiangjiang Literary Troupe's Land Reform Task Force came to Lituo Township on the banks of the Liu Yang River on the eastern outskirts of Changsha, to help the peasants with land reform and to divide up their fields, and at the same time, to create literary and artistic works reflecting the new life of the peasants.
The 19-year-old Xu Shuhua, the lyricist of Liuyang River, was a member of the troupe. He had a good voice and loved to sing folk songs.
Soon, the fall harvest was coming, and the peasants who had been given their fields were motivated to grow grain, and they paid their rations quickly, and on the way to delivering the grain, there was a bit of catching up with each other. Xu Shuhua was inspired, intends to compile a small opera "on the road to send grain". At that time, the Land Reform Task Force team was located in a shrine, Xu Shuhua often attended meetings, and returned to the house very late. One day he came back very late, and in the dark, the road was narrow and potholed, so he stumbled and almost fell into the roadside ditch. It was this stumble that touched his conception: grandfather and grandson pushing a cart to deliver grain, and a young man on the road and you chased me, accidentally car stuck in the ditch. Because the grain is loaded, the grandfather and grandson can not lift the small strength, and asked the young man to help. Young farmers intend to amuse, said to the child: you can answer my question to help you lift. So the song and dance mini-series "Double Delivery of Food" was born.
The composer of Liu Yang River
A year later, in May 1951, the performance group of Double Delivery of Grain traveled to Wuhan to take part in the selection of the Central and Southern Region and was successfully selected. However, the organizer requested that the tune of Liu Yang He be changed from the original Peking Opera tune Little Cowherd to the tune of a Hunan folk song, because the other two sections of the play were sung in Hunan flower-drum opera cadences, and Little Cowherd did not fit in there.
Then Xu Shuhua had another mission and did not participate in the performance, and the leader of the group, Chu Shenghong, gave the task of changing the tune to Zhu Liqi, who was the conductor of the orchestra and also played the drums. The time was short, and there was no time to lose. Zhu Liqi had an idea that he had performed a Hunan flower-drum opera "The Widow in the Field Watching the Melon" a year ago, in which one of the songs "Delivering the Melon" used the music of Hunan Qiyang Minor Dance. The composer was Tang Biguang of the Changsha Workers' Literary Troupe. Could this tune be applied to "Double Delivery of Food"? At that time, Zhu Liqi had limited access to Hunan flower-drum tunes, so he had no choice but to give it a try. He boldly changed the rhythm of the original tune, changing the slow four beats of the original tune to fast two beats, so that the adapted tune showed a joyful mood. Several actors try to sing, are considered very successful.