Yakun night reading 丨 Qiancheng's "spring" (with sound)

...... (Excerpt)

The Spring Festival in Qianzhou is the sentiment of the Qianzhou people to pray for the smooth wind and rain of the coming year and the yearning for a better life in the image of "spring". This simple and beautiful complex made the Qianzhou people of the acute zi after the severe cold, unable to wait for the high mountains of the Wuling Mountains to take off their snow-white winter clothes and change into spring clothes, so they began to do it themselves, buried the dream of winter in their hearts, and smeared one stroke after another, piece by piece, and thread on the body of "Spring", and spread the bitterness of the past year and the wishes of the coming year on the body of "Spring". It was a kind of awe, a kind of relief, and even more a kind of thought. These "springs", which are vividly shaped, festively dressed, and exude the beautiful hearts of artists, are the cultural seeds preserved by the Qiancheng people, which awaken the dreams of generations of Qiancheng people with the melody of spring, and bring people a warm and happy enjoyment.

Judging from the craftsmanship handed down by today's craftsmen, Qianzhou za spring equinox "paper tie", "dress spring" and "tie spring", and mainly based on character modeling, with flower branches as a foil. "Paper ties" are mostly based on the needs of the storyline, using stalks and paper to form cattle, dragons, fish, shrimps, mussels, turtles, lotus boats and so on. "Dressing up in the spring" is to select a handsome, lively and cute virgin boy and girl around the age of ten, dressed as a mythological or dramatic character, commonly known as "Chun Ling'er". Most of the roles are well-known myths and legends, classical dramas and historical figure stories, which are easy to understand and popular, such as "Sun Wukong makes a big fuss in the Heavenly Palace" and "Heavenly Daughter Scatters Flowers". "Binding spring" is in the special lifting frame, the dressed "spring boy" with a small horse to send a high pole to pose, and then tied with a soft cloth strip, high and low staggered, according to the custom of one spring per month, a total of twelve units a year, thirteen in leap months, each spring tells a story.

"Spring performance with scattered flowers and colorful flowers" is the climax of the Qianzhou Spring Festival activities. During the spring tour, the first rainbow that appears after the paper-tied fish, shrimp, flower lanterns, lotus boats, mussel shell essences, and smiling luohan is a simple and vivid "Spring Cow Diagram", in which a shepherd boy rides a flute on the back of a cow with a whip, which means "spring urging". The color of the spring cow is calculated according to the imperial calendar to calculate the weather conditions of the year: the head of the bull is painted red to indicate a spring drought, the waist is painted red to indicate a summer drought, the tail is painted red to indicate an autumn drought, the whole body is black to indicate a flood, and the blue in the middle indicates a storm. The shepherd boy wears a bucket hat on his head to indicate that there is a lot of rain and waterlogging, the back of the bucket sign indicates that the wind and rain are smooth, and the bucket hangs on the horn of the bull to indicate that there is a great drought, so farmers are most concerned about the changes in this colorful spring when they look at the "spring". Then a float full of spring and flowers and branches appeared in turn, they walked the streets and alleys, light and shadow flowed, attracting villagers from all directions to gather and watch.

Qiancheng's "Spring" is the epitome of the agricultural civilization in western Hunan Province, which comprehensively uses folk handicrafts and painting techniques to reproduce the development process of ancient human civilization with its vivid shape, vivid colors and unique forms. Not only can people get artistic enjoyment, but also can obtain agricultural meteorological information from it, predict the spring scenery of the year, and concentrate on the cultural tradition of Qianzhou people to carry forward truth, goodness and beauty, fully reflect the aesthetic taste and national sentiment of Qianzhou people, and become a window for the world to know, understand and study the mysterious culture of Qianzhou and even western Hunan Province.

The "spring" of Qiancheng, the joy of putting happiness into the child's heart, still makes me reminisce endlessly, more than 50 years, can not forget. That pleasure poured out many of the blocks in my chest.