Quanzhongqinshi: Music and Dance Materials

Author: Dance History Research Group of the Chinese Dance Art Research Association
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-01-19
Features: Many people believe that China is a country with underdeveloped dance art. In reality, Chinese dance art has been extremely rich and beautiful since ancient times, with a long and fine tradition. However, after the Song Dynasty, due to the continuous suppression by feudal emperors and scholars, as well as the persecution of artists and the loss of many dances in wars across different dynasties, many famous dances have become untraceable today. Despite this, the dances preserved in the, including theatrical dances, are still quite abundant. Especially, the dance arts of ethnic minority groups are particularly complete and diverse. We must inherit the original traditions and develop them, establishing a new dance art for China on the foundation of tradition. We study the history of Chinese dance to clarify the development path of Chinese dance art, summarize past experiences, and provide reference materials for the creation of dance art in new China. Music and dance are inseparable. Studying dance history requires studying music history as well. Both music and dance are temporal arts, making them difficult to preserve and prone to loss. Music can still convey some sense of sound from old scores, but dance is much harder to leave behind images—unlike today, when there are many recording tools. In the past, documents on dance art were extremely scarce, and even those that could be found were often vague and imprecise. Some famous dances are only mentioned by name in historical records; others are even mentioned only in scattered notes, novels, and poems without specialized records. To conduct a historical study of ancient dance art, we must exhaust all means to collect materials from various aspects, extracting reference and corroboration from the available information—textual records, murals, artifacts, carvings (including stone carvings, brick carvings, and patterns on various vessels), pictures, and more. We must gather these materials from all directions—not only from all over China but also from abroad—and organize them. We must emphasize the work of collecting materials, and the collected materials should undergo classification, comparison, review, and verification—a series of fundamental academic tasks. When studying ancient dance, we should not overlook the living materials that still exist today. From Zhou to Song, and from Song to the modern era, we have roughly outlined the development of Chinese dance art. We have gathered the available materials—whether complete or fragmented—by era and broadly classified them, deciding to focus our research on the Tang Dynasty. The Tang Dynasty was a period of great development in music and dance in Chinese history. Clarifying the music and dance of the Tang Dynasty will make it easier to understand those of the Song Dynasty. We plan to study the music and dance of the Tang and Song Dynasties first, and then trace back to the Sui, Six Dynasties, Jin, Han, and Zhou periods, which may be more convenient. Regarding the music and dance of the Tang Dynasty, there are relatively more historical records, murals, carvings, artifacts, and research writings by many experts, but they are still insufficient as a foundation for systematic dance history research. We need to make more efforts to explore materials from all over the world and throughout history. In terms of textual records, we have read all 48,000+ poems in the Complete Tang Poems and extracted materials related to music, dance, and clothing, categorizing them into music, dance, and clothing with brief explanations. Eight or nine people spent four months working hard and still achieved some results. However, due to working separately, lack of experience, and the need to meet deadlines for printing, despite repeated checks, omissions and errors are likely inevitable. We hope to use these materials and others to cross-reference and verify, deepening our understanding of Tang Dynasty music and dance and providing a reference for the study of Chinese music and dance traditions. For this work, Mr. Yin Falu, despite his busy schedule, provided much guidance and personally wrote the general introduction to the music and dance section and the introduction to the music section, which we deeply appreciate. If one person were to compile this book alone, it would take several times as long. By working together and exchanging ideas regularly, we save time while achieving better results. Based on the experience of the Dance History Research Group over the past year, research work should better leverage collective strength. Many young people, once they find a path, can become enthusiastic and quickly produce results. We believe in them, give them freedom to work, and invite experts to guide them regularly, and they will be able to do the job well. This is how collective strength can be unleashed, leading to more, faster, better, and more economical outcomes. Will this individuals? Not at all. Through mutual help and inspiration, progress can be even faster. As long as one is willing to work hard, collective support can better help them develop their talents and become experts more quickly. The attitude and methods of treating academic research as personal property, closing doors to hoard one’s own findings, are no longer viable today. Academic research must be both broad and focused, meaning it should cover the full picture while also delving deep into key issues. It must be realistic—knowing what one knows and what one does not know—and be able to confirm what can be confirmed while tentatively assuming what cannot be confirmed. Any research work, no matter how small the findings, should be respected. To be honest, our comrades in the Dance History Research Group have very weak foundations in dance history, to the point of having none at all. We only wish to learn humbly and continuously collect and organize materials (ancient, modern, and contemporary) as a foundation for writing a formal dance history. We hope that learned experts will not hesitate to offer guidance at any time.