The picture shows Li Jing holding a dragon ball and performing a competitive dragon dance. Photo provided by Li Jing
China News Service, Chongqing, February 16th: Title: Intangible Cultural Heritage Messenger "Little Dragon Girl" Let Tongliang Dragon "Dance" to the World
Author Ma Jiaxin
Accompanied by sometimes soothing and sometimes exciting music, the young dragon dance team members kept running, jumping and tumbling on the stage. Li Jing, who is wearing a colorful dress embroidered with dragon patterns, dances with dragon beads and performs difficult movements such as standing shoulders, spirals, and unilateral movements, presenting a scene where "a dragon comes out of the water and overturns the river, and the dragon soars across the sky."
Li Jing, born in 1999, is the captain of the competitive dragon dance team of Tongliang Dragon Art Troupe and the only girl in the team. Since its establishment more than three years ago, the team has participated in various competitions at home and abroad and won gold medals, with more than 30 medals.
Tongliang is known as the "Hometown of Chinese Folk Culture and Art" and "The Hometown of Chinese Dragon Lantern and Dragon Dance Culture". Tongliang Dragon Dance was included in the first batch of national intangible cultural heritage lists in 2006. Tongliang Dragon Competition is a dance art form popular in Tongliang District, Chongqing, with dragon as the main prop and integrating folk dance, music, art and handicrafts.
In 2021, in order to prepare for the national dragon dance competition, Tongliang District needs to form a competitive dragon dance team with an average age of 22 years old, and invite the representative inheritor of Tongliang competitive dragon dance intangible cultural heritage to serve as a coach. In other aspects, we started year-round preparation training.
Li Jing, who was looking for an internship in her senior year, cherished her love and yearning for dragon dance since she was a child, and went through many layers of selection to become a dragon dance team member.
"I started learning Chinese dance when I was 5 years old, and started to learn dragon dance in high school. I have 11 years of experience in dragon dance." After joining the dragon dance team, Li Jing and her team members trained for more than 7 hours a day in accordance with the requirements of the athletes.
"A competitive dragon performance requires one dragon ball and an 18-meter long dragon. The dragon dance team requires 11 people. One of them holds the dragon ball and the other 10 people dance the dragon body." Li Jing said that the dragon ball plays a guiding role in the dragon dance. The dragon follows the dragon ball and continuously shows various postures, which is very vivid.
In addition to the basic characteristics of ordinary dragon dances, competitive dragons also have the characteristics of higher, faster and stronger competitive sports, which require high difficulty and gracefulness. "I will add Chinese dance elements such as big jumps, horizontal turns, and flips to the training. With the switching of music, I will find a balance between hardness and softness, making the whole performance more enjoyable." Li Jing in Dragon Dance Innovation and thought were added to the performance.
"The biggest challenge is psychological. All the awards we have won so far are gold awards. We are very afraid of making mistakes during the performance." Li Jing said that dragon dances are live performances, and there cannot be any mistakes in any movement. She often faces these challenges when preparing for competitions. Crying secretly due to the pressure on my face.
When Li Jing performed in Malaysia, Bulgaria, Singapore and other countries, she found that many local people liked dragon culture. "Our Tongliang dragon is quite cute. Many foreigners like to come and take photos and ask us to teach the dragon dance moves."
"Participating in competitions and performances at home and abroad, I traveled thousands of miles, met tens of thousands of people, won countless awards, and received countless applause." What makes Li Jing even more proud is that she can spread the word about Chinese dragons when she performs abroad. dance culture.
"When we performed in Bulgaria, tens of thousands of people came to watch before the performance. After the performance, the applause lasted for a long time." Li Jing said that she feels proud to be a descendant of the dragon every time she performs abroad.
How to make the dragon dance performance always new? Li Jing said that in order to cater for the difficult movements, her dragon ball was modified and reduced in weight to about 1 kilogram, making it more flexible and lighter to dance. The entire team changes a set of music and movements every year, and the performance costumes also incorporate intangible cultural elements.
"In addition to competitions, we also have to do cultural exchanges and commercial performances. The income can subsidize the income of the team members, and everyone is very motivated to perform." Li Jing believes that the inheritance of intangible cultural heritage needs to be given commercial value.
Li Jing has her own clear plans for the future. "After I retire, I want to be a Tongliang dragon dance coach and teach more young dragon dancers." Li Jing said that she is willing to be a messenger of intangible cultural heritage and let the Tongliang dragon "dance" to the world. (over)