Girls’ Songs

61.Girls’ Songs

Nominating Unit: Leizhou Municipality, City of Zhanjiang

Popular in Leizhou Peninsula, the Girls’ Songs is a special type of singing derived from Leizhou Duet. Mainly based on the local annual rituals, the songs are usually sung by famous singers to pay tribute to gods. As time goes by, in small groups, the singers form semi-professional teams to stage performances. And since most of the performers are female singers, it gains the name Girls’Songs. Dating back to the late Ming Dynasty, the song reaches its peak during the Reign of Emperor Yongzheng in the Ming Dynasty. Now most of them are distributed in Leizhou, Suixi and Xuwen cities and the surrounding areas including Lianjiang, Dianbai, and the zone long Wuchuan and Zhanjiang suburban districts.

The songs touch upon a variety of subjects like hailing the merits of loyalty, fidelity, singlemindedness and attacking demerits of treachery and pruriency; it also deals with astronomy and geography, humanity philosophy, local customs and cultures as well as daily production life. Most of the lyrics are in a seven-word per line-four-line per segment pattern, intermitted with fi ve-word lines or multi-word lines. The lyrics, rhymed every other line, are quite similar to Leizhou Songs in term of ornamental words, metrical feet, and sounds.(https://www.daowen.com)

Sung in Leizhou dialect and without accompaniment, the tune is simple, unsophisticated and often improvised. Its performance can be divided into three types. Type one, for offering sacrifices to gods or ancestors, is performed on the occasion of annual god worshipping where singers kneel down in front of the shrine to praise gods and pray for good fortune, a rather solemn ceremony; type two, in singing contest form, is usually carried out between singers on the stage and audience off the stage. Its competitiveness makes the scene full of excitement and entertainment; type three, in combination of singing and dancing, is often based on stories and sung between a male and a female. The male called“Xiangjiao” (competitor) and the female “girl”, sing while waving fans or scarves as the prop and moving to the rhythm. As the whole process is intermingled with story telling, the song has begun to show signs of drama that is to come later.

The large amount of works that stands the test of time provides precious materials for the study of Leizhou Peninsula’s history, economy, culture, religious practices and social psychology. Its roleplaying feature, combination of singing and dancing as well as narration throughout the performance usher in the advent of local Leizhou Drama. Sadly, the impromptu characteristic of Girls’ Songs pales alongside newly-born singing contests whose themes are pre-given, and its active and vivid nature is being restrained. Furthermore, the lack of talented young singers worsens the status quo. In light of such situation, effective protection measures are, without doubt, urgently needed.