Lion Dance in Singapore

The Lion Dance is a skilled combination of two dancers under the wraps! They remain anonymous hidden under the powerful skin of a lion!!

The Lion Dance is a form of traditional dance in Chinese culture, in which performers mimic the lion's movements in a lion costume. It is the traditional dance of Singapore, which is recognized today as one of the world's modern metros with its huge shopping malls, busy harbors and tall skylines. Few know that the word Singapore or Singapuram literally means `Lion City’. As a city whose name is derived from the king of the jungle, its traditional dance form should also reflect some of the qualities of the animal it admires most.

The lion is obviously a large animal and it takes two dancers to fit into the costume. While the audience watch the lion energetically moving and shaking its head, opening its huge jaws and staring with bulging eyes, there are two dancers tucked inside the costume, one forming the back legs and the other the fore legs of the animal. This needs perfect synchronicity and rhythm. To complicate matters, the team sometimes moves between platforms of varying elevations. The sound of gongs, drums and firecrackers sets the pace for the dancers and makes the heart beat faster.

There are a number of Chinese Lion Dance styles but the two most popular Chinese lion dance styles are the northern and southern Lion Dance. The northern lion is usually red, orange, and yellow in color (sometimes with green fur for the female lion), is shaggy in appearance, with a golden head. The northern dance is very acrobatic and is mainly performed as entertainment. The southern lion dance is more symbolic in nature. It is usually performed as a ceremony to exorcise evil spirits and to summon luck and fortune. The southern lion exhibits a wide variety of color and has a distinctive head with large eyes, a mirror on the forehead, and a single horn at center of the head.

What do we see when we watch a Lion Dance performance? Do we see the lion or do we see the performer? Dance is a form of self expression and in most dance forms the dancers using their eyes, limbs and graceful movements tell a story or a tale and entrap the audience in their spell. How about a dance in which the dancer is never seen, entrapped as he is in a large costume? This is the uniqueness of the Lion Dance where the dancer entertains the audience. He feels the pulse of the audience, he can hear the applause, he can experience the movements of his co-dancer, but throughout this experience he remains anonymous.