Chinese Lion Dance

[Kung Lek]

hi SiFuChuck.

Water Greens , although I have not performed that particular dance I have seen it a few times.
essentially the laisee is placed under water and the lion must figure out how to get it without spilling the water.

Drunken, is also known as "wine greens" where the laisee is placed under a jug of wine.
The buddha will find the wine jug and alert the lion, the lion comes, drinks the wine and is all of a sudden tarnsformed and acts quite vigorously (like a drunk). The footwork is more complex in drunken routine and has a lot of "drowsy" moves in the lions expression with stepping and head actions.

I myself have been working out stepping patterns and motions for a drunken routine and would like to develop it further with sifu when given the opportunity to do so.

alot of "he's gonna fall!" stuff in it. quite entertaining.

anyway, after the lion gets drunk and gets active, the lion then gets drowsy and falls asleep for a bit. then the buddha finds the laisee that the lion left behind in his "stupor" and wakes the lion and then directs the lion to the location of the laisee.

the lion collects the laisee, once again becomes triumphant and then ends the routine with standard bows and a dismount.

The Crab routine that I have seen is done with Chang Fei Lion or the fighting lion.
essentially the lion is curious about the crab (which is another player in a crab costume).
The black fighting lion approaches and is scared away a few times (by the crabs movement), in this case the crab represents the greens.
Soon the black lion figures that the crab is not a threat and he approaches the crab and proceeds to take it apart limb by limb until the whole crab is "eaten" and the laisee is revealed and captured. Triumphant routine follows, then bows and dismount.

water greens can be a really hard puzzle.

drunken routine can be very demanding on the players in the lion.

see you on the lion dance list!
peace

the crab routine is very different but is more traditional than contemporary lion dance.

Kung Lek

[tricky-fist]

Actually, in our particular style of tiger fist, we have a specific Lion-Dance which involves a performer fighting the Lion with a staff, and then butterfly knives. Forget what the Chinese name is, but the name of the dance translates into “Riding the Tiger Down the Mountain�. It is supposed to pay homage to an old Chinese folk hero who won his fame killing tigers.

I can find out more if you like… seeing as the Lion Dance practices have been axed lately until my Sifu thinks our legs are up to par, it’s been a while since I’ve even thought about this stuff.

Kung Lek,

I liked your Sifu's article in this month's Kungfu/Qigong on the Lion Dance!

Respects,
TF

" I'll play it first, then tell you what it is later..."
- Miles Davis

[Kung Lek]

Thanks TF :)

I'll let him know.

peace

Kung Lek

[hasayfu]

I've never heard of a strict rule against weapons and lion dance in fact there is precedent to have weapons around during lion dance. In the Hung Gar tradition of hong kong, we would hang butterfly knives on the drum to show that it was a fighting school. You could be asked at any time during a show to take the knives and perform a set to show martial skill.
As mentioned, there are changs that contain weapons. Those changs, traditionally, require the lion dancer to do a form with those weapons to show martial skill. There are also routines that involve fighting the lion with weapons but those come from the Opera roots and are not part of the southern tradition.
Finally, in the old days, when a lion dance was marching through town, there would be two people with long poles to clear a path for the lions. They would also be used to "corral" the lions when another team was approaching so the Sifu's could talk first.
That said, a traditional procession would always have the lion dance first (after the pole guys), the band next, flags and banners, and the "school." Members who could be holding weapons, doing hand forms, etc. Usually, they are just marching.
While on a stage, I would find it distracting to do both at the same time. For our kwoon, we usually do a lion dance show with a beginning and ending then start the kung fu demo immediately after that. It's all the same people and the band drums the music for the demo but I consider it a seperate thing.

[hasayfu]

Thanks to Kung Lek for all the chang info. South East Asia still performs alot of the traditional changs since their Chinese communities were established long ago and they retain alot of the traditions and superstitions.
Unfortunately, these traditional changs are boring to the uneducated viewer and there is a lot of room for interpretation which can lead to offending the requestor. Thus less and less teams are keeping this tradition.
I was told that some businesses used to invite several teams to do a chang and if they did it incorrectly, they wouldn't get the money.
Our kwoon does the drunken routine and it's much like kung lek described. We used to do the crab routine but instead of a person in a suit, a live crab is used.
I've seen water changs and was told that we used to do one but it didn't involve not spilling water. The skill was in mounting the the bucket and spraying the water to the crowd.
There are many other changs, Fruit, Coconut, Daikon as well as puzzles where you have to unlock the code which is sometimes based on the I-ching.

[bean curd]

my understanding of the crab is different to that of kung leks.
the obsticle of the crab was/is a favourite of fish mongers and restaurant owners (they also love drunken lion).
the body of the crab is represented by a wicker basket/cane basket, the eyes two manderines and claws usually two sugar cane.
the red money and lettuce are usually placed infront of the crab.
this obsticle is not hard to accomplish.

a more difficult addition to this obsticle, is
called "crab within a crab".

the traditional way is to destroy the basket and the outside crab, which is described above. the danger is that there is a live crab inside the wicker basket, and the player must not injure/hurt/de-claw/kill this live crab.

a live crab represents "a thriving business".
in cantonese the word for "live crab" rhymes with the word for "business".


therefore to de-claw or kill the live crab is tantamount to destroying the business of your host.

to return it intact and alive is seen as a good sign that the hosts business will continue to thrive and prosper

[Paul Skrypichayko]

I've heard/seen the crab done both ways, basket, and live crab. There are a lot of different changs shown in those world lion dance championships that are hosted in Singapore and Malaysia. I recommend checking those out.

[Kung Lek]

I'll say.

If you can get your hands on the Genting VCD's or even videos from taiwan, malaysia or singapore to see all the different varieties of traditional and non-traditional lion dance you will be surprised to see all the varieties and to boot you get to see some realy good skills and acts from these competition teams.

A lot of the "new" lion dance routines involve poles and moving along very high poles.
This was developed from traditional routines where they would use a pole to lift the head and the dancer in the head up along side a building to get the greens.

Many times, the player from the tale would not go up with the head, but instead would steady the post with other team members while the head went up to get the greens.

In the modern dances, both members in the lion make their way along a series of poles and sometimes on double cable wires to get to the end of the series where the chang is. Then they return back along the poles and wires to dismount.

I had not heard of the "crab within a crab" version before, that is interesting.
the point about the sounds of the words business and crab rhyming is worthy of note also!

peace

Kung Lek

[illusionfist]

Hey kung lek, do youknow where you can get those VCD's? I saw some clips on the net and those are some insane moves those guys are doing. Very entertaining.

Peace :D

[fiercest tiger]

in sydney in the early eights most kung fu schools carried weapons and the changs where sharpened for fighting.

the drum had a mini weapons rack withe a tiger folk , daggers, poles, spears, broadswords. what ever they could fight on the **** thing. dont see much of that anymore. :D

peace

bakmeimonk@hotmail.com

[Paul Skrypichayko]

I think you can get some of the VCDs through Sifu H.P. Siow. He is one of the coaches for Kun Seng Keng; the world champion lion dance team numerous times in the last ten years. If you do a search, you can find their website (sorry, I can't find the URL right now).

There is also lots of information on the liondance mailing list, and some of Master Siow's students on there as well.

In HK, I have heard that you might be able to get them from Yue Hwa department store, and through one student of Chan Hon Chung (sorry, can't remember his name either. He was lion dance champ in 1986 or something.

[SleepingDragon]

what your lion does has to be taken into context of what you are trying to communicate. The martial artist wielding the trident before the lion is reminiscent of the story of the martial artists hunting the nien or lion.

The weapons are used in chengs because of two things, the host is testing the groups Kung Fu if they are a matial lion. so in the case of the snake impeding the path they will any weapons for the body and fangs. If the group is a civil lion they will use things like a stalk of sugarcane for the body. There are no rules what to use for the body-staff, spear, three sectional staff, whip (7 and 9) etc.

Also, the most important thing about greens are the theme of the cheng. It is irrelevent if the cheng has no theme. The theme tells you all about the puzzle provided you are learned in chinese culture. Many are based on literature or change of luck like the snake. However, not all greens featuring a snake of some sort is bad and so you do not attack the eyes or snake.

[SleepingDragon]

Here is a link to my webpage

I wrote some information, some of you may already may know these things, others may find it useful. The first is the home page. Another is about lion dance and its hidden meanings. The third is about some of the different cheng formations. I think I have 150 listed so far. Just remember, there are many ways to set up and play. As I have learned, the most important thing to know is the theme, of course you have to know Chinese culture too. Hope you find it interesting and entertaining.


http://chineseliondancers.webs.com/

http://chineseliondancers.webs.com/C...on_Dancing.htm

http://chineseliondancers.webs.com/p...the_greens.htm

[Kung Lek]

Hi-
Illusionfist- go to this site to find out where you can get the vcds or videos of the genting competitions as well as other Lion Dance material.

It's a really good site, and if ya like, join the mailing list. Lots of great information disemminated daily through the folks here.

http://www.geocities.com/lionscave1/Main.html

and here is another one!

peace

Kung LekGenting.com

[hasayfu]

This off topic from the attn:Frank thread so I'm starting a new one.

I do recommend people get the DVD and support these guys. TigerClaw was abig sponser too.

In regards to tradtional vs. Modern liondance. Each has their own aspects. Most of the winning schools that win international competions have traditional teams. Even the "Jong" competitions are emphasizing more animation.

I've been to Malaysia, Singapore and Hong Kong and seen the teams there. Traditional is alive and well but has evolved.

I was also a judge at the West Coast competion. The DVD is out. I highly recommend it. http://www.lion-dancing.com/product.asp?itemid=9

Take a look at the trailer on the home page http://www.lion-dancing.com/nfldc/home.html I'd like to see traditional lion dance head this direction. BTW, Yau Kung Moon won this comp.

CLF Noble, is your si-sook doing the traditional fat san lion dance and keeping the "old" drumming? Just curious. I see too many teams now opting for the Hok San style of lion and drum. Great if that's your roots but these are traditional Fat San based systems like Hung Gar and CLF. The worse are the teams that opt the HS drum but use a FS head.