Fifth, clean and self-love
Mr. Liu is an artist of the old society, but he is an upright artist with both virtue and art, he is conscientious in his work and does his duty. At that time, his income was relatively high, and he lived in such a social background, and Mr. Liu had been clean and self-loving all his life, without any bad habits, and he advocated frugality in life. Although he performed in Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai and Han throughout his life, the main place of artistic practice was Tianjin, especially the Jiuzhan Song and Dance Building (later changed to Xiaoliyuan), a holy place of music and art. He didn't get up until about two o'clock in the afternoon every day, wash up and eat a little, take a little rest, slip through the passages he wanted to sing during the day, and then go to the theater at about four o'clock, Mr. Liu's home is in Beijing, Tianjin is the place to stop, the residence is closer to the theater, after arriving at the theater, change clothes, close your eyes, and prepare for the performance. The show returns around six o'clock, drinking tea, resting or meditating on luck. Because he felt very tired every time he came back from the performance, he always had to rest for more than an hour, eat some snacks at eight o'clock, drink some porridge, and drink porridge often accompanied by small dishes from the Tianchang Sauce Garden in South City. After eating, he began to raise his voice again, preparing for the evening performance. The evening performance is nearly midnight, and it is tea, meditation until about two o'clock in the evening, eating a formal meal, all small plates and small bowls, full of a small table, most of the small dishes, he eats less meat, occasionally stewed beef, but also with broth to boil vegetables, the meat to others to eat. Mr. Mei Lanfang invited Elder Liu to dinner, and also said that Mr. Liu did not move big fish and meat, mainly to light, mainly to protect the throat. His staple food is also very small, his favorite is purple rice steamed rice, the other is cornmeal with small dates baked nest head slices. Mr. Liu lived in Tianjin at a very young age, and the ordinary people of Tianjin loved to eat a kind of jujube nest that was steamed in cornmeal, and Mr. Liu had been eating this food for decades.
His only hobby was bathing, and at that time his Beijing and Tianjin residences had no bathing equipment and could only go to the bath. A frequented place in Tianjin is Longquan Pond on Binjiang Road (there was even before the Cultural Revolution), and a poinsettia of incense in Wang Guangfu Xie Street outside the Qianmen Gate in Beijing. Mr. Ma Lianliang also loves to take a bath, and the two masters often meet unexpectedly, and most of the conversation they get together to talk about is to exchange artistic experiences with each other.
Mr. Liu often participates in church performances, and even if the master prepares delicious food for each performance, he does not move chopsticks, no matter how the master pleads, he does not eat, which is not Mr. Liu's pretense and strange personality. He once said: "More than half of those high-ranking officials and nobles look down on artists, and they invite you to dinner with the meaning of "appreciating rice", and the more they look down on us, the more we must respect ourselves." ”
Sixth, the benevolent person loves others
The front row is from right to left: Liu Baoquan Bai Yunpeng, and the back row is from right to left: Han Derong, Zhong Dehai, Hou Yichen, Zhong Shaoting, Su Maoxian
Although Mr. Liu lives a frugal life, he is generous and caring to others. If a friend is in a hurry, he never spares money and money, and helps him with his money. When Mr. Zhuang Yintang was alive, he had contacts with many famous actors in the Peking Opera and Qu art circles, such as Gao Qingkui, Yu Shuyan, Zhang Shouchen, etc. Mr. Liu was also Zhuang's friend and artistic collaborator. Liu's "Ning Wuguan", "Xu Mu Scolding Cao", "White Emperor City", "Capture Sanlang Alive" and other singing sections have all been polished and adapted by Zhuang, and after Zhuang's death, his family was poor, and Mr. Liu often gave financial support. Even if there are people with no contacts, such as Yuan Shikai, who has a grandson, once passed through Tianjin, was strapped for money, and found Mr. Liu, Mr. Liu still gave help. He often said: "It is easy to go up the mountain to catch the tiger, but it is difficult to open your mouth to ask for people", and it is difficult for a person to turn his back to the person's hand and face down until he has to. As for the interaction with friends who know each other, there is also the feeling of "light fat horse with friends, and we have no regrets".
In his later years, Mr. Liu had a heel bag, who was only seventeen or eighteen years old at the time, named Su Maoxian, and people called him Xiao Su at that time. This young man is very disciplined, duty, family conditions are more difficult, Mr. Liu whether in Tianjin or Beijing, Xiao Su is not far from the left and right to serve, he himself Mr. Liu is all responsible for the cost of living, in addition to giving Xiao Su a salary, but instructed him to pay his salary to the family to supplement the family, do not spend money indiscriminately. He often warned Xiao Su: "You have indeed been bullied and beaten outside, I have reasoned with them, if you are beaten because of 'tricks and grass', I will beat you when I go home!" Although Mr. Liu is widowed, because he is a famous corner, so he often receives "invitations" in the style of flying posts and nets, in this case, Mr. Liu often asks Xiao Su to take money to his home with a part, but tells him that he must not ask others to reward money, nor should he eat there, so as not to make people look down. He also considered that he was old, if there were three long and two short, Xiao Su would be difficult to have, so he entrusted him to his good friend, Mr. Ma Fulu, a famous and ugly Peking opera artist: "Fu Lu, I see that Xiao Su's child is very honest and hardworking, if I am gone, I hope you can take him in." Ma Fulu immediately agreed: "Sir, you can rest assured!" After Mr. Liu's death, Su Maoxian always gave Ma Fulu a bag, and after liberation, he joined the Beijing Peking Opera Troupe with Mr. Ma until his retirement in his later years.
Mr. Liu was still a man of national integrity, and in the early summer of 1937, when Japanese militarism was constantly provoking incidents in Northern China, sending heavy troops to Fengtai, Nankou, Tongxian, Gubeikou and other places, and even more looking at Beijing and Tianjin, at this time Mr. Liu was in Beijing, and at the invitation of the Twenty-ninth Army, he did not pay any conditions for the garrison officers in Nanyuan, Dongmencang, and the Summer Palace, respectively, and made condolence performances. Mr. Liu was particularly shocked by these performances, he wanted to contribute the best art to the garrison officers, Liu Lao's first performance in Nanyuan, he led the actors to Nanyuan very early, the performance venue is a square, there are more than ten miles in the circle, Liu Lao can't help but frown , "With our fleshy voice, can the officers and soldiers hear it?" You have to find a way. Asked if the troops had a loudspeaker, the troops said no, so Elder Liu, Cao Baolu, and Gao Deming said: "You go to the radio station in Beijing and find a way to solve a loudspeaker through the radio" Cao and Gao did not fail to live up to Liu Lao's entrustment and found Zhao Yansheng of the Yansheng Radio Station, and Zhao promised to solve it, and as a result, he borrowed a loudspeaker from "Yansheng", loaded it into a car with two loudspeakers, and pulled it to Nanyuan Airport. Elder Liu's performance of "Single Knife Society" was complete and all-out, which won the welcome of the vast number of officers and men, and similarly, the two places of Dongmencang and the Summer Palace performed "Changshanpo" and "Nanyang Guan" respectively, and also achieved satisfactory results.
Seven, a long passing away
Mr. Liu Baoquan took the stage for the last time before his death, singing "Double Jade Listening to the Qin" (accompaniment: Han Derong, Zhong Dehai)
Mr. Liu has been performing in Tianjin Xiaoliyuan in his later years, returning to Beijing after the Dragon Boat Festival every year to rest, and returning to Tianjin on the seventh day of the seventh month of the seventh month of the lunar calendar. In 1942, Mr. Liu was already seventy-three years old, originally Mr. Liu was in good health, life was regular, diet was particularly attention, in addition to eating, only love to eat fruit, so the body has always been very good, even the teeth have not fallen out, he brushed his teeth with ice water in the summer, cold water in winter, until the twilight years, the teeth are not damaged in the slightest, somehow, just after returning to Beijing this year, Mr. Liu's spirit is obviously not good. But Elder Liu said that he was not sick, nor did he feel any major discomfort in his body, but he felt that his body was lazy, he could not lift his spirits, he ate tastelessly, and of course, the amount of food was decreasing day by day.
At the beginning, he also beat his spirits, lived and moved on time, and did not let go of his hanging throat. In the blink of an eye, it was already the beginning of July, Tianjin Xiaoliyuan came to pick up Mr. Liu to perform, at this time Mr. Liu hesitated, he did not dare to rush to go, discuss with the garden, and postpone it for half a month. Half a month later, Tianjin came to pick up people again, still did not go, it seems that the body is more unwell than before, had to postpone for another month. Postponing the performance is something that mr. Liu has never done before, he loves his career, and the Jingyun big drum is the cause for which he dedicated himself. His audience loves his art and respects his people, he has become a kind of fish and water relationship with the audience, how he hopes to meet the audience on the stage again! But he really couldn't support it, and at this time, his heart was very painful.
Sure enough, it wasn't long before he was bedridden.
During the illness, he once asked him to ask several famous Western doctors, but he never found any disease, he was bedridden, because of the difficulty of eating, he injected glucose every day to maintain his life.
Mr. Liu pays the most attention to hygiene. When he was still able to get out of bed, he insisted on getting out of bed every day to wash up, and then he really couldn't get up, so he asked Bao Xiaosu to help him wash and bathe in bed. After being bedridden, his wife, daughter and granddaughter look after him during the day, and Xiao Su was on duty at night.
In the late night of the twenty-ninth day of the eighth month of the lunar calendar (October 8, 1942), he gently tapped the bed with his hand, asked Xiao Su to help him sit for a while, and said that he wanted to drink some water, Xiao Su immediately poured a cup of water bed to help him, who knew that he had not yet sat well, he shrugged his head and collapsed in Xiao Su's arms.
A generation of drum kings finally drove the crane west.
At that time, it was the period of Japanese and puppet rule, and people were living a life of humiliated slaves under the iron hooves of the Japanese Kou, and they did not have the heart and economic strength to do funerals. Therefore, except for some close friends, peers and people in the Peking Opera circle who have friendships, more people were buried without alarm.
8. The legacy is fragrant
Mr. Liu's Jingyun drum is a strange branch and a treasure in China's traditional music art. The Liu Pai Jing rhyme he created influenced a generation of music styles and still plays a role today.
Little Lan Yun in his youth
Sun Shujun
In the past, the bottom program of quyi performances was mostly single-string or five-tone combined, since the formation of Liu Pai Jingyun (about the 1920s), Jingyun has accumulated almost a foregone conclusion, not only Beijing and Tianjin, but even Ji, Han, Shanghai and Ning, which are all the credit of Mr. Liu. Due to the improvement of the status of Jingyun in the music venue, the practitioners of this song were really like carp across the river at that time, especially those who learned Liu Pai's Jingyun, even if bai (Yunpeng) and Zhang (Xiaoxuan) actors combined, it was less than a quarter of Liu pai's. However, most of these Actors of Liu Pai Jingyun are women, and there are also many people who are active in the quyi stage and have certain influences, such as Jin Huijun (stage name Little Black Girl), Lin Hongyu, Liang Xiaolou, Zhang Cuifeng, Sun Shujun, Sang Honglin, Xiao Lanyun, Hou Yueqiu, Xiao Yingxia, etc., all of whom are masters of the art industry.
Group photo of Bai Yunpeng, Fu Shaofang, and Yan Qiuxia
Lin Hongyu
Lin Hongyu, Liang Xiaolou, Sang Honglin and Yan Qiuxia are four famous artists of Jingyun
Hou Yueqiu
Luo Yusheng
As for Mr. Luo Yusheng, his early years of singing also taught the Liu School, and later absorbed some artistic components of the White School and the Shaobai School, and according to his own conditions, he finally created the "Luo School" that was famous in the music world.
Not only are the Jingyun actors Zong Liu, but other genres, such as the famous Drum Master Zhao Yufeng of Xihe, the famous actor Qiao Qingxiu of Henan, the famous actor of Liaoning Big Drum Zhu Xizhen, and the single string cao Baolu, etc., have all been more or less influenced by Mr. Liu, and Mr. Liu has also given a lot of guidance to their singing art.
Bai Fengming
Left Zhong Dehai, right Han Derong
Single-string master Tan Fengyuan
Mr. Liu's disciples were not many, and the only people who formally worshiped him were Chang Xujiu (after singing Lianzhu Kuaishu), Bai Fengming, Tan Fengyuan (later changed to single string), Han Derong, and so on.
Liu Baoquan developed from a timid drum to a very popular Jingyun drum, which is a lifelong effort and never forgets to keep pace with the times. I think that today when we study Mr. Liu, we mainly learn from his spirit, and only in this way can we push our qu art career to a higher peak!