Every Spring Festival, many places in China have the custom of dragon and lion dance. In Guangning County, Zhaoqing City, the hometown of Chinese martial arts, there is still a custom of tiger dance, but it has disappeared for many years. The Spring Festival in 2022 is the Year of the Tiger in the Chinese Zodiac, and the Baoding Mountain Scenic Area has specially restored the custom of tiger dance, sending tourists a wonderful and unique tiger dance performance and blessings of tiger and tiger life, and also allowing tourists to understand the history and culture of this martial arts town. On January 29, the scenic spot organization personnel began rehearsals.
In daily life, many people have seen lion dances and dragon dances, and not many have seen tiger dances. In all parts of the country, there are only a few places where the custom of dancing the tiger is practiced, including Guangning County in Zhaoqing City. Regarding the Tiger Dance, it is recorded in the book "Gu Clan Moving South": "Ancestors migrated south from the Central Plains and entered the Vietnamese Sea, experiencing hardships, and who knows the dangers?" Thousands of miles of running, food and material consumption, unique heirlooms, tiger heads, rain and sun, with the crowd over the mountains and mountains, tiger dance foraging, fighting tigers in the ring, who can distinguish between true and false!"
According to some elderly people in Guangning, the tiger dance has a heavy traditional cultural color and a strong local atmosphere, and is deeply loved by the masses. The spiritual symbolism of the tiger includes majesty and power, bravery and fearlessness, prayer for blessings and avoidance of evil, etc. Tiger Dance prays for the public a good harvest, the safety of people and animals, a prosperous business, and a smooth heart.
For the story of the tiger dance, it is said that during the Ming Dynasty, a dart master mistakenly entered the deep mountains, encountered a tiger, and fought with the tiger and beat the tiger, which is quite a fragment of Wu Song fighting the tiger. In order to record this story and show the bravery of the Guangning martial artists, the people of Quang Ninh invented the custom of dancing tigers. For the fathers and villagers of Guangning County, the "hometown of martial arts", every year on the first day of the Spring Festival, the most important program is to watch the annual Lion Awakening Martial Arts Performance Competition, dozens of Lion Awakening Martial Arts Troupes from various townships gathered in the county, competing for the Law, paraded in teams, and performed around the village, which was very lively. In the past, there were also dancing tigers in the team, which basically disappeared in recent decades.
2022 is the Year of the Tiger of the Chinese Zodiac, located in Guangning County, Baoding Mountain Scenic Area restored the custom of tiger dance, specially found old artists to make 2 tigers, and rehearsed according to the dance method of the elderly population, and the first rehearsal began on January 29. In the afternoon of the same day, in the small square of the scenic spot, the sonorous gongs and drums sounded, and 2 colorful, dazzling, and majestic "tigers" came out of the cave and descended the mountain, striding with their heads held high, walking on the road with great swagger, sometimes combing their hair and whiskers, sometimes looking around with their heads held high.
The "tiger" took a leisurely square step, suddenly found the prey, suddenly became alert, raised his ears to listen carefully, crawled to the ground, ready to attack at any time. The prey appeared in front of the eyes, and the "tiger" swooped down on the prey and grabbed the prey with relish. After eating, the "tiger" met another "tiger", a mountain does not allow two tigers, of course, to fight, the winner is the king.
According to the artist who directed the rehearsal, the movement routine of the tiger dance is somewhat similar to the lion dance, waking up from the tiger from a deep sleep, going down the mountain to find prey, preying on prey, finding the tiger, fighting between the tiger and the tiger, and returning victoriously. In the close sound of gongs and drums, the "tiger" appeared to show its might by jumping, turning, flipping, spinning and other actions, sometimes tumbling on the ground, sometimes jumping high, showing natural scenery such as mountains, mountains, rocks, streams, streams, ropes, bridges, and water through actions, and showing the tiger's awakening, moving, stillness, joy, surprise, doubt, fierceness, anger, and happiness with various difficult and thrilling movements, as well as the spirit of not being afraid of difficulties, bravely moving forward, not being willing to fall behind, and having the courage to fight. At the same time, it also revolves around the theme of "human-tiger fighting, human-tiger coexistence", showing the picture of human beings living in harmony with tigers after defeating tigers with wisdom and superb martial arts.
Because of its heavy traditional color and strong local atmosphere, the tiger dance is deeply loved by the local people and is an indispensable entertainment activity for the New Year's Festival. In the old days, the tiger dance was basically performed on the same stage with the dragon and the lion, in addition to their respective actions, there were also lions and tigers competing, lions and tigers celebrating spring, dragons and tigers fighting on the same stage, the scene was grand, the atmosphere was warm, the plot was vivid and interesting, and it was very infectious.
According to the relevant person in charge of the scenic spot, Guangning is the hometown of Chinese martial arts, martial arts, dragon dances, lion dances, tiger dances are all local characteristics of Guangning regional culture, lion and tiger set martial arts, dance and other arts in one, condensing the sweat and wisdom of generations of folk artists. To this day, it still maintains the original local cultural atmosphere. Therefore, the inheritance and development of tiger dance has important significance and cultural value, and it is necessary to inherit the dissemination and innovation, continuously carry forward and inherit these excellent folk skills. Therefore, it was only then that the custom of restoring the tiger dance during the Spring Festival of the Year of the Tiger will allow the tiger dance to return to the public vision, be inherited and developed, and become an important project of traditional culture and folk skills, and glow with new vitality and vitality.
The customs of the Guangning people to practice martial arts can be traced back to the Warring States Period 3,000 years ago, and according to the Records of Guangning County, 12 people in Guangning County were admitted to the Martial Arts in the Qing Dynasty. After the reform and opening up, Guangning martial arts are even more vigorous, and martial arts masters have emerged, represented by Qiu Jianguo, Zeng Qinghuang, Lin Quan, Chen Xun, Fan Xiaoling, Chen Zhicheng, Liang Jianbo, etc., and a total of 25 people have visited 24 countries and regions, winning more than 270 gold medals in the national and Asian martial arts competitions. In 1992, Quang Ninh was officially named the first batch of "Martial Arts Town" counties in china by the National Sports Commission.