Modern Social Science Research

The integration of the five vocal genres of Sichuan Opera and the formation of its four major "Riverway" patterns are both closely associated with the great immigration movement known as "Huguang Filling Sichuan" during the Qing Dynasty. The influx of migrants from Huguang, Jiangxi, Shaanxi and other regions contributed to the recovery of Sichuan ' s population and economy. Meanwhile, a regional opera communication pattern—"waterways as commercial routes, and commercial routes as performance circuits"—emerged relying on water systems such as the Yangtze River and Jialing River. Extraneous opera troupes entered Sichuan along commercial routes, and the four major external vocal genres gradually integrated with Sichuan dialect and folk music through long-term practice. Eventually, the combination of these four vocal genres with local lantern tunes realized the "unification of five vocal systems" in a single troupe, laying the fundamental form of Sichuan Opera. Guild halls and theaters constructed by immigrants serve as material evidence of cultural integration, and their spatial distribution disparities reflect the regional characteristics of early Sichuan Opera communication. Combining the landforms of Sichuan and Chongqing, sources of migration, and the distribution of extraneous guild halls and theaters, this paper sorts out the transmission routes of vocal genres into Sichuan, interprets their diffusion paths, and explores the formative factors of the regional styles of the four "Riverway" systems.

Music geography; Chuan Ju; Vocal genre; "Riverway"; Migration