The She, an ethnic minority who mainly live in the mountainous areas spreading over five provinces along the southeastern coast, have a history dating back to theSouthern Song Dynasty(1127-1279 AD). This group has unique customs and language. Singing is one of their most important activities.
The She hold five annual song fairs: The April Fen-long Festival, the song fair on June the first, the song fair on July the seventh (the Qixi Festival -- China's Valentine's Day), the song fair of theLantern Festival, and the song fair of Double-Ninth Festival, all in lunar calendar.
Generally, the ballad of She can be divided into three topics: The narratives to sing myths and legends; The rituals to sing on weddings, ceremonies and for merits, And the miscellaneous to sing the daily lives and emotions. Particularly, the Ballad is sung in falsetto solo while it has a branch of Shuang-yin (bitonal) known for its rarity of harmonic polyphony in all ballads of China's ethnic minority groups.
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