Pengzhou City is located in the northwest of Chengdu Plain, with the middle section of Longmen Mountain Range in the north and the suburbs of Chengdu in the south. Pengzhou City has a long history and splendid civilization. As early as more than 3,000 years ago, there were signs of human cultural activities. During the Qin Dynasty, three counties under the jurisdiction of Shu County were established in the area of today's Pengzhou. "Pengzhou" was established in the Tang Dynasty, and it was not downgraded to a county until the Ming Dynasty. In the late Ming Dynasty, the immigration phenomenon of "Huguang filling Sichuan" appeared in Chinese history. When a large number of immigrants entered Sichuan, they also brought the culture and folk customs of the Central Plains. During the Kangxi and Qianlong periods of the Qing Dynasty, a variety of local operas from the Central Plains that entered Sichuan and local operas were integrated to form today's Sichuan Opera. In its own development, Sichuan Opera gradually formed a fixed vocal routine based on the content and performance methods of the repertoire. Some percussion instruments entered these routines, and the remaining percussion music cards were used by drama lovers to entertain themselves. Whenever there were festivals, they would spontaneously play them, adding a lot of lively atmosphere to the festival. Since the Chinese New Year is the biggest festival in Chinese tradition, people play the most music at this time, often starting from New Year's Eve and ending after the Lantern Festival on the 15th day of the first lunar month, so this form of performance is called "Nian Gonggu". Because this set of gongs and drums is performed when people are playing during the festival, it is also called "playing gongs and drums". Because the gongs and drums used are smaller than those used for stage performances, it is also called "small gongs and drums". Because it is small, it is very suitable for performances while marching, so it is well combined with the performances of dragon lanterns and lion lanterns. During the performances of dragon lanterns and lion lanterns, the gong and drum team uses "long mallets" to accompany, and plays the "Nian Gonggu" tune during the intervals between performances or while walking. The instruments used in "Nian Gonggu" are called "four pieces", which are composed of basin drums, gongs, cymbals and horse gongs. It can be performed with dragon lanterns and lion lanterns, or it can be performed alone, and it can also be performed with suona, which is called "set blowing". There are as few as 4 people and as many as 6 to 10 people when playing. Since the tunes of New Year's gongs and drums are relatively short, about 2 minutes, they are often performed in combination. Before the 1950s, New Year's gongs and drums were quite popular in western Sichuan. Almost every county and town had its own performance team, and there were even two or three teams in one town. In the 1940s, New Year's gongs and drums reached the peak. At that time, every New Year, dozens of gongs and drums teams from the suburbs of Chengdu gathered in Pengzhou to perform and compete for about 10 days. These gongs and drums teams are generally funded by local folk associations. For the winning teams, the organizers will hang red and give red envelopes to them as rewards. New Year's gongs and drums are a rare crystallization of the integration of Bashu culture and Central Plains culture in history. At the same time, it is a folk culture with local characteristics and has a history of more than 300 years. It is a "percussion music" that originated from the folks and was passed down from the folks, with a strong "original" and simple charm. The New Year's gongs and drums are the cultural characteristics of an era and the witness of a period of history. They reflect the folk customs of a specific era. From the names of its unique tunes, we can see that it is closely related to people's labor and life, and reflects the artistic refinement and generalization level of folk artists of all generations. It not only reveals the breath of real life, but also exudes romanticism. It records and inherits the connotation and extension of Sichuan Opera in the form of gongs and drums. Some of the New Year's gongs and drums also imitate the sounds of some animals and the sounds made by people in the labor scenes, which fully reflects the creative wisdom and superb skills of folk artists. The New Year's gongs and drums once brought joy and hope to tens of millions of people in western Sichuan; enriched the spiritual life of generations of artists and audiences; cultivated many creatures of that era in the most simple artistic way, and reflected the economic and cultural development of a place. It has become a page of history recorded in folk local music, which has important historical value for studying the development of folk music in western Sichuan. Today, the traditional tunes of New Year's gongs and drums can not only still be used for folk performances, but also injected with new vitality through the borrowing, transformation and innovation of musicians, creating tunes that are rich in traditional cultural flavor and contemporary style. This not only inherits and develops this traditional folk music art, but also leaves today's contemporary atmosphere for our descendants, making this dormant art shine brightly. Information source: Chengdu Intangible Cultural Heritage Protection Center Information source: Chengdu Intangible Cultural Heritage Protection Center