Lisu Folk Songs

Lisu Folk Songs

Lisu people advocate singing in tune. In the multi-voice unaccompanied chorus of Lisu people, the three major tunes of Lisu folk songs are "swing time", "excellent leaf" and "wood scraper", which have the reputation of "canyon tianzi".

On May 20, 2006, Lisu folk songs were listed in the first batch of national intangible cultural heritage list with the approval of the State Council.

historical origin

Lisu people first lived in the Jinsha River basin at the border of Sichuan and Yunnan, and then gradually moved to Nujiang area in Western Yunnan to settle down. They mainly live in Nujiang Lisu Autonomous Prefecture and Weixi Lisu Autonomous County in Yunnan Province, while the rest are scattered in Lijiang, Baoshan, Diqing, Dehong, Dali, Chuxiong and Xichang, Yanyuan, Muli and Dechang counties in Sichuan Province. Lisu has its own language. Lisu belongs to the Yi branch of Tibetan-Burmese Language Group of the Sino-Tibetan Language Family.

Lisu people are very fond of singing in tune. There is the saying that "salt, no eating, no singing, no singing". Folk songs are simple and touching, with rich tunes. Traditional dances are mostly collective dances, which imitate animals and animals, and also show production and life. In daily life, Lisu people often use songs to speak for themselves and answer for them, thus forming a tradition of liking folk songs. The annual Tangquan Song Festival in Lushui, Bijiang and Yunlong is a place where singers can fully display their talents and sing continuously for several days. Lisu youth like to sing love songs, there are traditional, improvisational creation, accompanied by the choreographer; there are long love songs, there are short.

artistic characteristics

Subject matter is abundant

Lisu folk songs are varied, including wood scrapers, pendulum and foliage songs, which can be sung by the old and the young. Ordinary people go out, go up the hill, walk, touch the scenery and sing. This aimless, word-of-mouth folk song can be heard at any time during the day in the fields, on the ground or on the hills or on the roads, but the tunes are mostly the same, and there are only differences between speed and speed. Some express between words, others express between sentences, and express inner joy, joy, or depression and sadness with different speeds and speeds.

Classification of Songs

Lisu folk songs include wood scraper, pendulum and excellent leaves.

Wood scraping

Wood scraping is one of the most important and popular folk songs of Lisu people, which is spread in Lisu people's inhabited areas in Nujiang Lisu Autonomous Prefecture, Yunnan Province. Wood scraper refers to all songs and tunes in Lisu language, and gradually becomes the specialty of narrative ancient songs. Other songs and tunes belonging to wood scraper category are generally crowned with content, such as Achimu scraper (goat tune), its running wood scraper (three-string tune) and so on. Wood scrapers are mainly used in traditional narrative poems with serious content and solemn atmosphere, and they are often sung at national festivals, gatherings and other times and occasions. The melody is simple and deep, with a desolate and ancient style.

Wood scrapers are generally divided into two sides by middle-aged and old men, sitting cross-legged around the edge of the fire pond, each with a male and female identity to answer questions and sing. When singing in pairs, both sides are led by one person, accompanied by many people, the lead singer sings one sentence, the accompanist and one sentence, while singing with wine to boost the fun, while drinking and singing. Wood scraper duet singing also has the characteristics of competition. If both leaders are good at duet singing, duet singing often lasts for several days and nights. The traditional narrative songs of Lisu people sung in pairs with wooden scrapers are widely related to ethnic origin, human reproduction, production and life, customs, love and marriage, religious beliefs and ethnic exchanges, which vividly reproduce the broad picture of the social history of Lisu people and have high cognitive and aesthetic value. For example, the long narrative song "Escape Marriage Tune" reflects the marriage customs of Lisu people, such as "referring to the belly for marriage" and "employing cattle for marriage", the social custom of fighting for freedom and love by escape marriage, the original belief of killing sheep to attract soul, beating dog's hair, splashing blood and wine to gamble, and the spirit of solidarity and the social productivity level and production status of Lisu people.

With the death of the older generation of singers, nowadays few people can sing the content of Lisu Wood Scraping History Song and Long Narrative Song. If we don't rescue and dig in time and train the younger generation of singers, wood scrapers will face the situation of no successors.

"Pendulum" and "excellent leaf"

"Pushing time" and "Youye" are the two most representative Lisu folk songs in Nujiang Lisu Autonomous Prefecture, Yunnan Province. It is widely spread in Lushui County and Lanping County. It is popular among the Lisu people in peacetime and festival gatherings, harvest celebrations, marriages and other festive occasions. The lyrics are extensive and the tunes are warm and unrestrained. It is suitable to express the inner passion and is deeply loved by the Lisu people. Most of the time is for collective male and female duet singing, but also for self-entertainment solo singing by one person. The content of singing can be divided into two categories, i.e. "Duo Me" and "Jurisdiction Me". "Duo Me" mainly sings long traditional narrative poems, while "Jurisdiction Me" improvises according to the singing objects, mostly with love and current affairs as the main content. The representative repertoires are "Bamboo String Song", "Song of Recalling Bitterness", "Orphan Tears" and so on. The annual "Bath Pool Competition" in Denggeng, Lushui County is a grand occasion for singing in pairs. Youye is mainly spread in Lisu villages in Fugong County. It can be divided into two categories according to the content and form of singing: one is composed of middle-aged and old people sitting around a fire pond while drinking and singing, the main content is to recall the sadness and suffering of the old times, the melody is low, slow and smooth; the other kind of melody is relaxed and lively, which is the main way for young men and women to convey their feelings, and also can sing to each other. Can sing in pairs with the same sex. The first type of euphoria has been less popular, and the second type of euphoria is still widely circulated. The common songs of Youye are Hunting Song, Silent Talk, Chopping Wood Song and so on.

Shishi and Youye are the outstanding representatives of Lisu oral literature and art. Through the creation of singers of past dynasties, they have accumulated extremely rich singing content for a long time, involving almost all aspects of social life and folk activities. At the same time, Yueye also created a variety of artistic expression techniques rich in national personality, such as the sentence pattern, rhythm and rhetoric characteristics of Lisu poetry mainly reflected through such folk songs. The pendulum and euphemism also reflect the typical music characteristics of Lisu folk songs, such as the multi-voice singing method, tremolo singing method and the use of linings of Lisu folk songs can be fully reflected in the pendulum and euphemism.

Art Performance

On the evening of June 16, 2009, the National Concert "My Motherland, My Home" was held in the Nier Performing Arts Center of Yuxi City, Yunnan Province. As one of the activities of the first Chinese Nier Music Chorus Week, the performance presented the classical national music of different nationalities, among which the ancient Lisu folk song "pendulum" made the audience appreciate the charm of "Tianzhu".

"Swing Time" is a Lisu folk song. It is sung in the occasions of festival gatherings, harvest celebrations and marriages of men and women. Its lyrics are extensive and its tunes are enthusiastic and unrestrained. "Swing" is mostly a collective duet between men and women, and can also be performed by one person as a self-entertaining solo. The content of singing can be divided into traditional narrative poems and improvisational choreography with love and current affairs as its main contents.

The 60 performers of the "pendulum time" chorus, who appeared late on the 16th, came from nine villages and towns in Lushui County, Yunnan Province. Most of them lived in the alpine mountainous areas with an altitude of more than 1800 meters. They had never received music training. They passed on the "pendulum time, excellent leaves and wooden scrapes" culture of the Lisu people through oral transmission.

The choir sang three songs that night. In the singing of the two songs "Welcome to the Land of Time" and "Sing Happy Landscape", the folk songs are lively, enthusiastic and enthusiastic by means of singing in pairs, singing in pairs and bringing people together. The Choir has also made bold innovations in this form of music, singing the foreign song "Friendship lasts forever" with the "swing" singing method. Although the audience can not understand the lyrics, the characteristics of affectionate singing and "swing" folk songs make the audience appreciate the charm of traditional music.

Representative Works

Representational singing contents such as Genesis, Production Tune, Shepherd's Song, Escape Marriage Tune, etc.

Inheritance Significance

Lisu people advocate singing in tune. In the multi-voice unaccompanied chorus of Lisu people, the three major tunes of Lisu folk songs are "swing time", "excellent leaf" and "wood scraper", which have the reputation of "canyon tianzi". On May 20, 2006, Lisu folk songs were listed in the first batch of national intangible cultural heritage list with the approval of the State Council. According to Guan Yundong, head of social Arts Department of Nujiang Cultural Bureau, in the past two years, Nujiang prefecture has focused on the collation and protection of Lisu folk songs. In 2008, more than 400,000 yuan was invested in the collation and protection of Lisu folk songs at provincial and state levels. A 650-page collection of Lisu folk songs was published, and preliminary results were achieved in the protection of Lisu folk songs.

It is understood that since the special protection work of Lisu folk songs was organized and carried out in 2007, a special project group has been set up in Nujiang Prefecture. Special posts have been set up in the cultural centers of the prefectures and counties, and special personnel have been arranged to collect and arrange Lisu folk songs. The staff interviewed more than 60 old Lisu artists in the whole state successively, collected more than 170 Lisu folk songs, recorded nearly 1200 minutes, recorded more than 1000 minutes, and photographed more than 1600 pictures. On the basis of investigation, 87 manuscripts of Lisu folk singers, 87 finished Lisu folk songs and 130 single audio-visual songs were formed.

Nujiang Prefecture promotes the protection and inheritance of national traditional culture by organizing rural farmers'literary and artistic performances, supporting folk art troupes and subsidizing the inheritors of national culture. Up to 2008, there were more than 160 rural literary and art teams in the whole state, including dozens of folk art troupes inheriting traditional national culture. At the beginning of 2009, Nujiang Prefecture also issued a one-time subsidy of 3,000 yuan to 22 provincial inheritors of intangible cultural heritage. During the "Cultural Heritage Day" in 2009, Nujiang Prefecture will also grant 8,000 yuan to two national representative inheritors of intangible cultural heritage.