Whenever there are special days such as festivals, weddings and funerals, the people in the countryside will hire a drum and music band. This custom has continued to this day and is gradually being accepted by more and more people. "Speaking of Dandong drum music, Zhang Jiwu, deputy director of the Intangible Cultural Heritage Protection and Research Center of the Dandong Municipal Bureau of Culture, talked about it. "Such a precious folk art should not only be collected and sorted out, but also passed on. "Drum music has been popular in Dandong for at least a hundred years. It is recorded in the early county chronicles of Dandong, such as "Andong County Annals Weddings", "Fengcheng County Annals Funerals", and "Fengcheng County Annals Annual Events". Dandong drum music is what the common people call "drum and wind music". There are many types of instrumental music, and the tunes are even more rich and diverse. It is a traditional instrumental music performance form based on national wind instruments and percussion instruments. It has been deeply loved by the masses for many years. Dandong drum music can be divided into two categories: "Suona Music" with suona as the main instrument and "Shengguan Music" with pipes as the main instrument. The half-meter-long bass suona played by folk artists belongs to the "trumpet music" in "Suona Music". The bass suona has a rough and heavy tone, which is suitable for expressing sad and mournful emotions. The "Xiaozhazi Music" played mainly by the treble suona has a bright and high-pitched tone, It is suitable for expressing a happy mood and is often used in wedding ceremonies. There is also a performance form called "Three No Puts" by artists, which is played by high, medium and low suona at the same time. It has clear layers and full of charm, which vividly reflects the joy of people in festive activities such as festivals and weddings or entertainment activities during the slack season. It is worth mentioning that the "unique skill" of drum artists is "Ka Opera". The so-called "Ka" means simulation. Drum artists with higher skills use a suona to realistically simulate the singing of various birds, and can also express the singing of operas, various emotional changes, and the intonations of different characters vividly. In addition, some drum music classes add percussion instruments, string instruments and plucked instruments as the background music in the performance form of suona and shengguan, which enriches the expressiveness of the drum band. The structure of Dandong drum music is generally divided into "tang" and "song". Dandong drum music can be divided into three categories: "Blowing Songs", "Paizi Songs" and "Suite Songs". "Tang Blowing Songs" are also called "Zuotang", which are generally composed of three parts: introduction, body and tail. The introduction of Dandong drum music "Tang Blowing Songs" is an impromptu, irregular cadence, which reflects flexibility. The "body", the main part of the music, is more complex and changeable. In addition to the fast flowing board, other types of boards such as cadence, slow board, medium board, etc. are almost all performed. The "tail" of "Tang Blowing Songs" is generally understood to be similar to "epilogue". In fact, the "tail" is precisely the climax part of the music. Compared with the complexity of "Tang Blowing Songs", "Paizi Songs" are relatively short, lively and cheerful, and are often played on festive occasions. Dandong drum music is of great significance to the study of the development history of Dandong folk music. Now is the time when Dandong drum music is relatively prosperous. During the period, there were more than 50 well-known folk drum music classes in the city, most of which were active in counties, districts, and towns. Due to the particularly strong festive atmosphere of drum music, it has gradually expanded to cities. The inheritance and development of Dandong drum music is thanks to the persistence of old folk artists and their descendants. Wang Tingchun, an old artist of Wang Tingquan Folk Drum Music Class in Donggang City, is now 95 years old and is the sixth-generation inheritor of his drum music class. He started learning at the age of 10 and has not given up yet. He plays an amazing suona and passed this skill to his son Wang Shugui, the seventh-generation suona artist of the Wang family. Wang Shugui's son Wang Chengjun also learned from his father and became the eighth-generation inheritor of Wang's drum music. At present, there are only a few old artists who can inherit the skills of Dandong drum music. If we do not step up collection, sorting and research, Dandong drum music art will face the crisis of being lost. This has attracted great attention from the cultural department of Dandong City. As early as the 1980s, corresponding protection measures were taken. Local cultural experts have also conducted long-term research on Dandong drum music, and the main results have been included in the book "Collection of Chinese Folk Instrumental Music". What is more gratifying is that Dandong drum music has been included in the list of intangible cultural heritage of our province. (No pictures yet, welcome to provide.) (No pictures yet, welcome to provide.)