Long- lasting Thanh Hoa Cheo: In Mind & Heart

The year of 1939 was the last time when Mung village (Trung Thanh commune, Nong Cong district, Thanh Hoa province) held a course to teach songs and Cheo performances for local singers and dancers. To date, the art of Cheo in Mung village is recalled from memory of local artisans who are nearly hundreds of years old. Being a diversified treasure with Cheo Can and Cheo Nuoc, Mung village’s Cheo has a distinguished feature which gathers quintessence of the land region where it was born in. It is very different from other forms of Cheo nationwide. from memory of local artisans who are nearly hundreds of years old. Being a diversified treasure with Cheo Can and Cheo Nuoc, Mung village’s Cheo has a distinguished feature which gathers quintessence of the land region where it was born in. It is very different from other forms of Cheo nationwide.

 

In the old days, every three years, on lunar March 5-8, people in Mung village held Le Kỵ Thanh festival. The Chinh Ky Day (March 5) was the performing day of Cheo Tho at Mung Temple, attracting the participation of 18 villages. Today, people break the rules and organise Cheo Tho festivals on every Ky Thanh Day, which was attended by just eight villages.

 

Mung Temple and the village’s Cheo art originated from the legend about Duc Thanh Luong Ngu Vi (Le Ngoc, a general in China’s Duong dynasty). The legend has it that the saint was a talent general, who did not surrender to the domination of China’s Duong dynasty, raised troops and built the citadel to fight against the Duong dynasty. The fight movement failed and the saint sacrificed. After that, people set up the temple to worship him. According to the legend, when the saint sacrificed, his older sister also jumped into the Lang Giang River to commit suicide. Her corpse drifted to T-junction, the meeting place of Lang, Hoang and Yen rivers. Then her body was fished out and buried by local people. They also established a temple to worship her and called her as the Queen. Therefore, on every lunar March 8^th, there was the custom named “The brother visits the sister”. During the event, people took the saint called Tham Xung Ta Quoc to the Queen’s temple by boats along the Lang Giang River. The festival of Cheo Tho in March included diversified activities, including Cheo Nuoc and Cheo Can.

 

To prepare for the March Cheo Tho festival, people in eight villages had to make preparations from January. Swimming and singing contests happened along the two bank shores through night to prepare for Cheo Nuoc performance and bring the saint to visit the sister. People in the villages hurriedly got everything ready from practicing singing, sailing, buying clothes, preparing rice and food, repairing boats and cleaning their villages’ roads and temples.

 

In the morning of lunar May 3, after the worshiping ceremony, Cheo Can festival started at the yard of Mung Temple. A bottomless dragon boat with bamboo frame covered with red cloth was put in the middle of the yard. Twelve 12 female mandarins who were wearing dress, red scraf, pink blouse, green belt and had short-pig-tail hair stood in two rows along the ship sides. Each was holding a dar, singing and sailing following the drum beat: Every March, people sailed on the worshiping ceremony.

Along with the ceremony and performance of Cheo Tho Can, at Da station after Mung Temple, five big dragon boats decorated with many striking colours and their beds arranged look like houses with roofs docked at Da station. There were six flower gates on each side of boat side. Each flower gate had red-lacquered dar and inside it were seats of swimmers. On each boat are 12 young girls who were wearing female mandarins’ clothes and sailing on the temple yard.

 

When hearing the order from altars, female mandarins got into boats, hung their hats on walls, sat on seats and hold red-lacquered dars. Getting ahead was two boats which guided the way, followed by incense-table boat, royal boat and support boat. The team of boats ran wherever, bamboo elephants, paper horses, people with masks, soldiers holding eight instruments on the ashore cheered, making noise along the shores of the Lang Giang River. Coming to each village on the river the boats going through, female mandarins sang songs among 28 old operetta tunes of Mung Village. Arriving at Vang Village, they sang: “Dragon boat has come to Vuc Si/ what are girls in Vang Village doing or staying at home? Local girls who were gathering on the shores responded that: “Vang Village is picking up bermuda grass/Hearing the sound of the boat, we come here to welcome”. Coming to Bay Village, people on the shores sang: “Praying to God, Buddha and King/ This year, wish for a handful of sticky rice for children”. Female mandarins pinched sticky rice on boats and threw it to the shores, while people on the shores took off their hats to catch the sticky rice to bring it to their home. They dried and put it into vases to wish for luck and use it as the medicine when they suffered from diseases.

 

Arriving at the Queen’s Temple, after taking the saint to visit his sister and finishing the worshipping ceremony, the temple keeper and local old people prayed Ying and Yang to bring the saint back. While waiting, people continued singing until the elder asked for Ying and Yang for them. The time they said good bye to one another was called the end of the festival.

This form of Cheo is performed at funerals, particularly, for Muong ethnic minority people whose longevity is at least 70 years old, so it is called Cheo Ma. It is only sung in front of the coffin. The story about the only artisan of Cheo Ma attaches to the art. At the age of 10, Cao Ngoc Rang left Muong Muot to learn Cheo Ma with powwow Bui Van Phuc in Ba Thuoc. The learning fees were two buffaloes and a cow. At that time, Rang had to slaughter the buffaloes and cow by himself to serve Phuc. The story about the process to learn Cheo Ma was narrated by Rang in a way that a Muong person using King Language did. “Phuc’s house is as dark as in a cave. Mosquitoes here are as much as ants, but I was not beaten. At the beginning, I felt scared and wanted to stop learning, but Phuc drew a signal of the cross in the middle of my brow and mumbled something. I guessed for sure that he was using a magic. From that, I sat still and quietly without being beaten by mosquitoes and felt safe for the study. After three months, I acquired Cheo Ma and six months later, I could play music and performed this form of Cheo fluently”.

 

Rang followed the teacher for Cheo Ma performances in six 6 Muong localities (Cam Thuy, Ba Thuoc, Dien Lu, Thach Thanh, Ngoc Lac and Lang Chang in Thanh Hoa) for more than six years. When he was 17 years old, Rang came back his village and set up the Cheo Ma team of Muong Muot and became famous.

 

The performance of Cheo Ma lasted three days and three nights with 10 “dars” and games divided into two parts: sad and joyful Cheo. The sad Cheo include songs telling about parents' kindness: “... My eldest son comes here/ I want to give these words to you/ Our family’s assets are divided into three parts/ the eldest son receives the smallest, the youngest gets the biggest/ The food is shared equally/ Do not give to children unequally.”

 

Joyful Cheo included dances and songs, focusing on the topics of showing gratitude to one's parents and humorous stories.

 

According to Muong people’s custom, when farther (mother) or grandparents passed away, their children and descendants had to bring with them buffaloes to invite the team of Cheo. If their families were rich, all children and brides and grooms, each brought with him/her a buffalo to invite the team. If the person who came to invite the team is the host, they would meet questions raised by songs: “Where are you going? With hairless head/No hair and with tear?”. The person had to respond that: “Looking for head of the Cheo Ma team/My father dies/I feel like that I lose every year and month/Inviting the team to the house for bury for brightening the house/ But not brightening the house, having to invite the head for singing”.

When arriving at the head’s house, offerings had to be arranged like in the song: “Inviting the team must have 10 francs/ With cloth to tie cylindrical drum for Cheo signing”. At that time, the head would blow the whistle and called on the team members to go to the funeral. Therefore, many funerals of Muong people were very exciting like festivals. At that time, the head would blow the whistle and called on the team members to go to the funeral. Therefore, many funerals of Muong people were very exciting like festivals.

 

Life of Muong in Thanh Hoa has now changed much compared to the time of Cheo Ma. Currently, Cheo Ma is only remembered as a nice memory in the old artisan’s heart and mind.