Quyi Storytelling and Ballad Arts · Kuaishu and Kuaiban (Clapper Recitation) · SE10167

Lu Da Rids the Town of a Bully

The record that named an art form

Introduction

Gao Yuanjun's 1949 record of this piece gave Shandong kuaishu its name

Lu Da Rids the Town of a Bully is a traditional piece of Shandong kuaishu, and the version heard today is Gao Yuanjun's. In June 1949, while recording it for the Great China Record Company in Shanghai, Gao formally named the art form Shandong kuaishu; before that it had been called Wu Laoer, bamboo-clapper kuaishu or comic kuaishu. Gao came from Ningling in Henan, yet he chose the name after the Shandong speech in which the form is performed. A centenary article on him lists this piece, with Li Kui Seizes the Fish and Wu Song Fights the Tiger, among the pieces he reworked and played most often in his lively, humorous style. Shandong kuaishu is chiefly rhymed recitation with some spoken lines, and it entered the first national intangible heritage list in 2006.