The city of Jilin, in Jilin province put on a Yangko performance where dancers from districts and counties gathered to go on with the Spring Festival, on Feb 17, or the 10th day of the first lunar month.

Yangko team performing in a square in the city of Jilin, Jilin province, on Feb 17. [Photo/asiannewsphoto.com]

The Yangko is a rural Chinese folk dance in farming communities that is related to sacrifices to the gods and pray for a good harvest that goes back hundreds of years. As time passed it evolved taking on various artistic forms and approaches, including opera, acrobatics and martial arts, and eventually developed into the Yangko we see today.

Actors dancing the Yangko with northeast Chinese characteristics.