The Study On Shui Nationality Dance In The Fishermen’s Festival In RiZhao City, Shandong Province

The Fishermen’s Festival is the common feast for the coastal fishermen and formed as a local custom after long-term maritime fishing activities. The Fishermen’s Festival can be traced from the Kuang-hsu fourteen years, and originated in coastal regions such as Shijiu Suo, Two-city Town, Mountain Gang, and the Pei Village and so on, up till now, the Fishermen’s Festival is still prevalent alive and well flourishing in those areas of which the Pei Village plays an important role. The people who participate in the festival are mainly the ocean catching personnel, the fish-farming workers in shallow marine water, the fishermen and their relatives. Because the local residents live by fishing from generation to generation and rest their harvest and safety on the god of the sea, therefore, they pray for the bless of god and play the roles as fishes, crabs, shrimps and mussels in costume exaggeratedly, of which the purposes are to worship the sea god and express their expectation for better life through the scenes of "ample fishing harvest". As time goes on, the fishermen’s activities become more and more plenty so the religious activities and worshiping ceremonies are involved in the festival as well. The boatmen exchange fishing experience together and improve workmanship, the Fisherman’s Festival is gradually deemed as an integral part of their daily life as well as a significant folk activity. In2007, the Fisherman’s Festival was catalogued in the first set of the non-substance cultural heritage of ShanDong Province, and cataloged in the second set of the national non-substance cultural heritage the next year.The dance of Shui nationality is the most important component of the Fishermen’s Festival. By means of the scenes of dancing with sea god, the Shui Nationality attains union with god and expresses their pursuit and expectation for brilliant lives. The dancing movements originate from the simulation of the aquatic animals whose images are also exaggerated by means of costumes. The music is referred to the model singing and instruments paly in opera, and added the folk music of RiZhao in it. The performance reflects the Eight-Diagram posture and movement of Yin and Yang, it contains the sincerity of life, kindness of human though and regional beauty of esthetic sentiment, and characterizes lively local features. The dance generates a lot of media coverage and has been broadcasted in CCTV7<<Approaching RiZhao>> program and CCTV4<<谁Sea Song Narrative>> program. In2006, it’s catalogued in the first set of non-substance heritage of RiZhao.