Han Dynasty
At the start of the Han Dynasty in 200 BC, dance had already become a sophisticated art form in China.
There were many folk dances, some of which still exist, and many of these were humanistic, such as war dances, dances to ward off the plague, fertility dances, or were simply to do with love and marriage. But from these elements of choreography, musical composition and dress design a repertoire of dances had developed to be performed for the entertainment of the court and the leisured class.
Tang Dynasty Dance
By 600 AD, at the beginning of the Tang Dynasty, the spread of Buddhism and the expansion of the Chinese Empire had led to music and dances being imported from India and from the Central Asian area that stretched from Hotan and Kashgar to Bokhara and Samarkand. A description of a dancer from that period gives us an idea of what an educated viewer admired at that time: "Dressed in a long-sleeved gown, light as a cloud and silvery, she wore a head-dress of jade and pearl ornaments. She sang as she danced with light, delicate steps and her sleeves rose and fell with a slow, measured motion like a swan in flight. When she paused her eyes swept over the audience. At times she slowly brushed her sleeves across her face, then flapped them like billowing snow as her steps quickened." This could have described Yang Gui Fei (
) who became the emperor's favourite concubine or a slave girl attached to a rich household or a troupe of dancers.
Whoever she was, she had been rigorously trained from early childhood to dance with her whole body, feet, hands, eyes and face all co-ordinated to give expression to the music.
Under the Tang Dynasty the arts were greatly developed.
There was a government department in charge of teaching music and dance (ceremonial court music was under a separate Department of Rites), and a government sponsored school was set up to train musicians and dancers who were then sent all over the country. During the eighth century Turkish and Central Asian music and dance became fashionable. The Lion Dances had first started in the Han Dynasty also spread over the country at this time and were improved.
Two kinds of Dances for informal occasions were developed in the Tang Dynasty, Jian dances which were energetic and Ruan dances which were tranquil and sedate. Examples of Jian were sword dances and dances imitating galloping horses. They seem to have been like Cossack and Kazakh dances. Ruan Dances were mainly performed by women and were often solos. They emphasised the bending of the body and the patterns made by hand and arm movements, enhanced by long- sleeved dresses and by lengths of light material. Jian and Ruan dances are the basis for most of the dances performed today.The development of Chinese Dance
Any Chinese dance has a story to go with it and during the Tang Dynasty the stories developed into song and dance dramas that eventually became Chinese opera in the Ming Dynasty (1400 AD). The development of Chinese dance was completed in the Song Dynasty (960 AD to 1279 AD). Cities expanded in this period and many theatres were built. Dances such as the Precious Lotus Lamp, the Flower Drum Dance, the Story of Zhong Kui, became popular and are still performed today. Also at this time folk dances were recorded and achieved a settled form.Chinese Folk Dance by the 56 recognised minorities
From the time of the Ming Dynasty, as the opera developed and the educated classes took to reading novels, dance as an art form on its own was increasingly confined to folk dance. This continued to flourish, especially among the minority people. There are 56 recognised minorities in China today.
Tibetans, Mongols, Uyghur, Kazakh and Korean have notably distinct cultures from the Han Chinese. Others, such as the Miao, Dai, Yi and Yao, have their own traditions which were little influenced by the Han until the eighteenth century. The folk dances of the peasants and the minority peoples were encouraged and supported by state organisations after 1949.
This has led to a revival of dance as a separate art form distinct from the various kinds of Chinese opera and there is now a flourishing culture of dance, which is encouraged for its virtues as healthy exercise as well as for its innate beauty and historical interest.
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