Bobasengen

Name of China's national intangible cultural heritage: bobasengen

Applicant: Lixian County, Sichuan Province

Project No.: 665

Project No.: Ⅲ - 68

Time of publication: 2008 (second batch)

Category: traditional dance

Region: Sichuan Province

Type: new item

Applicant: Lixian County, Sichuan Province

Protection unit: Lixian Cultural Center

About bobasengen:

Applicant: Lixian County, Sichuan Province

Bobasengen Tibetan language means "the Tibetans with the lion on the dragon plate". It is a unique dance in Ganbao village, Li County, Aba Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan Province. It shows the history, culture and customs of Wutun (zagu, Ganbao, shangmeng, Xiameng, Jiuzi, etc.) in Daoguang period of Qing Dynasty in the form of situguozhuang in Jiarong Tibetan area.

Bobasengen was created by Tibetan troops to commemorate the fighting against the British army and the comrades who died in the battle. It expresses the patriotic feelings of the Tibetan people by praising the brave and good fighting spirit of the troops. Bobasengen activity is held every year on the Dragon Boat Festival, when all the villagers, old and young, will participate. The dance is divided into two parts. The whole performance takes about two hours. In the first part, the leading dancers hold the string bells and lead the dancers to sing and dance in circles. The lead dancer leads the singing, and all the dancers follow. After a period of singing, they begin to enter the "drilling" stage. The right hands of the two dancers were raised high, and the lead dancer passed through. The other dancers followed in turn, singing and drilling. After that is "twist", each dancer's left hand and the right hand of the front dancer hold each other and put it on the right shoulder of the front dancer. And then start to "solve", the dancer from the "twist" action back to hand in hand state, in this process, gradually around the center of the lead dancer. In the second part of the dance, the dancers sit in the middle of the circle and listen and sing again. After singing, the dancers cheered in unison and threw Longda to pray for good luck and happiness.

Bobasengen followed the performance form of the ancient situ Guozhuang in Jiarong Tibetan area (in Tibetan dance, Tibetan tap, Batang string and situ Guozhuang are best known in the world), and integrated it with the memorial ceremony of Tibetan troops, forming the Wutun Guozhuang in Jiarong, which showed distinctive local characteristics.

Bobasengen's melody is simple and clear. It adopts the two modes of "Shang" and "Gong" in the national mode, and creates the forms of "Zuan", "Zuo" and "Jie" in the dance. It creates the performance form of narrative singing by the lead dancer and listening by all the dancers. The research value of these unique and strong local and temporal characteristics is self-evident.

In recent years, due to the change of traditional production mode, the change of main economic pillar, the evolution of people's living habits and other reasons, the inheritance of bobasengen has appeared a serious crisis, which is in urgent need of rescue and protection.