Meeting at the Blue Bridge

Introduction

One of the best-known traditional errenzhuan numbers, also kept by performers in Tongliao

Meeting at the Blue Bridge, often called simply The Blue Bridge, is a traditional number of northeastern errenzhuan. The national intangible heritage site names it, with The Western Chamber, Lord Bao Apologises, Yang Bajie's Spring Outing and Pigsy Roots the Ground, among the best-known traditional pieces of the form. When errenzhuan reached the Tongliao area of Inner Mongolia in the early twentieth century, local performers kept this number and blended Mongolian folk tunes into the singing. In Chinese literature the Blue Bridge is the meeting place of lovers, and dying for a broken tryst is called a soul lost at the Blue Bridge; a Yuan play by Li Zhifu already set such a story there. Errenzhuan is sung and danced by a pair, a female and a clown role, and it entered the first national intangible heritage list in 2006.