Yingge Dance - Chinese War Dance

Yingge Dance is one of the dance forms of the Han Chinese people.  It is a popular folk square dance in Chaoshan area (Shantou, Chaozhou, Jieyang) of Guangdong Province, some parts of Shanwei, and Zhangzhou of Fujian Province, which integrates Southern Chinese martial arts and local theatrical arts into one.  It is also prevalent in Hong Kong, China, and Thailand.  Yingge Dance is one of the three subtypes of dances themed on the stories of heroes in Water Margin within the Minnan cultural circle, reflecting the spiritual outlook of the Minnan people.

The Yingge Dance in Chaoshan area integrates She songs, theater, dance, and martial arts, featuring unique step patterns, body movements, club techniques, and battle formations.  It resembles both a folk dance and a martial arts performance.  With its vigorous, powerful, rugged, and uninhibited dance moves, it creates a magnificent, majestic, strong, and heroic atmosphere, providing a thrilling experience of strength and beauty.  The roles performed in Yingge Dance are all heroes from the classic Chinese novel "All Men Are Brothers," but the expressive techniques are highly abstract.  Instead of narrating the story or portraying specific characters, it focuses more on rendering combat scenes and lively atmospheres to shape the collective image of heroes.  Through artistic treatments such as character portrayal, costumes and props, body movements, and sound rhythms, it embodies a kind of vigorous beauty as a whole.  The snake dance in Yingge Dance originates from the snake worship of the Minhai ethnic group.

On May 20, 2006, Yingge Dance was included in the first batch of the National Intangible Cultural Heritage List.

The main performance form of Yingge Dance is a large-scale group dance, in which dancers hold a short wooden stick (Yingge club) in each hand, striking each other above, below, to the left, and to the right with robust and powerful movements to create a strong rhythm. During the performance, the dancers also coordinate with musical instruments such as gongs and drums, as well as the rhythmic beats of the Yingge gong and drum"Dong Dong Cha, Dong Dong Cha, Dong Dong Cha," to create a magnificent and deeply moving artistic effect.