74 year-old Xing Tiankun was a successor of Xihe dagu. He studied it when he was a teenager. Besides at the area of Hejian, Xing Tiankun and his teacher performed in the Hejian area as well as in the three provinces in Northeast China.
Like most professional entertainers, Xing Tiankunstorytelling profession was cut short during the Cultural Revolution. He was forbidden to perform.
Xing Tiankun said he was a former senior entertainer who now is alone and forsaken; therefore, the county should help him and gave him a living allowance. Moreover, another wish of his is to instruct some students in Xihe dagu, because he do not want to take it with him to the grave.
Jingyun Dagu and Meihua Dagu
Location: Houmachang Hutong of Beijing
Artist: Guan Cuilan (90)
Jingyun Dagu
Jingyun dagu lays stress on singing and concentrates on depicting short episodes. It came into being and was popular in Beijing and Tianjin at the end of the Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the period of the Republic of China(1911-1949).
Liu Baoquan, who told stories in the Beijing dialect, replacing regional Hebei pronunciations, created this particular dagu. He absorbed the vocal music of the Peking Opera and Beijing folk tunes, which he incorporated into his Jingyun dagu, using the sihu (a four-stringed instrument) and pipa (lute) as accompaniments in addition to three-stringed lutes and wooden clappers.
Jingyun Dagu is popular to this day in the Chinese capital. It is divided into three schools, headed by Liu Baoquan, Bai Yunpeng, and Zhang Xiaoxuan, respectively. Liu attained the highest artistic achievement by earning the title King of Dagu. He made the greatest contributions to dagu and won esteem as the leading artist in his field. In the wake of the emergence of the three schools, another appeared, known as the junior Bai School and headed by the brothers Bai Fengyan and Bai Fengming.
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