Yangxian stick puppet show is a Han opera that uses Han tunes and Qinqiang as singing styles and stick puppets for performance. It is distributed in the urban and rural areas of Yangxian County, Hanzhong City, Shaanxi Province, and is the second batch of intangible cultural heritage protection projects in Shaanxi Province. Yangxian stick puppet show is a local Bangzi opera in which actors manipulate puppet characters to perform various actions and perform singing. It was born in the late Yuan Dynasty and early Ming Dynasty. By 1573 to 1620 (during the Wanli period of the Ming Dynasty), it had formed a certain scale and had a complete performance system and strong local characteristics. It was called "Shaanxi South Road Bangzi" during the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty. In the late Qing Dynasty, there were more than 10 puppet troupes in Yangxian County, and more than 120 theaters were built for puppet performances. In addition to performing in Yangxian, the puppet troupes were also invited to perform in Hanzhong, Chenggu, Xixiang, Foping and other places. During the Li Zicheng uprising in the late Ming Dynasty, Zhang Xianzhong's peasant rebel army had a puppet troupe that performed with the army. The puppet troupe spread throughout the Han River Basin, the north and south of the Yangtze River, and even to the southwestern border. It reached its peak in 1931 (the 20th year of the Republic of China). At that time, there were 38 rod puppet troupes (communities) in Yang County. After the 20th year of the Republic of China, due to natural disasters, the performance of puppet shows was affected to a certain extent. After the liberation of the country, puppet troupes gradually declined and began to enter a tortuous development period. In 1958, the Yang County troupe of puppets was established. In August of the following year, veteran artists Li Yicai and Zhou Yishou won the second and third prizes for performances at the Shaanxi Province Puppet Show Rehearsal Conference. The 0 Chinese Puppet Troupe was disbanded. Since then, the puppet show has entered the folk performance. Yangxian stick puppet show can be divided into Han-style stick puppet show and Qinqiang puppet show in terms of singing style. Historically, Yangxian was a Han-style stick puppet show. Since the liberation of the country, it has been a combination of Han-style stick puppets and Qinqiang puppets. Among the Han people, Qinqiang puppets are the main ones. The costumes of Yangxian stick puppet show are the costumes of Ming Dynasty drama characters. The puppet characters are divided into light hats and hard hats; the clothes are divided into outer clothes and underwear (used to connect the stick pole). The orchestral instruments in the civil field are banhu, erhu, huhu (bass banhu), jinghu, sanxian, sea flute, flute, and suona; the percussion instruments in the martial field are sharp drums, flat drums, hall drums, war drums, hook gongs, rao cymbals, small gongs, hinges, bangzi, teeth, wooden fish, throwing, horse gongs, earth cymbals, sea gongs, hanging hairpins, trumpet head drums, etc. There are more than 1,000 traditional plays, 651 of which have been sorted out and excavated. More than 300 of them have been performed, and more than 30 of them have been performed for a long time. Such as "Li Yangui Selling Water", "Zhuzi Mountain", "Searching Cups", "Tang Xuanzong Drunk", "Watching the Battle", "Three-family Store Hanging and Torturing", "Drunk Capture of Liang Fang", etc. There are more than 20 sets of percussion music scores, more than 120 suona string music scores, and puppet character props are about 80 cm high. Yangxian stick puppet show can be divided into dark rod puppets and visible rod puppets based on the form of prop performance and manipulation. The dark rod is wrapped in the character's clothes, while part of the visible rod is exposed outside the puppet character's clothes. The puppet prop structure consists of three parts: puppet head, puppet shoulder, and puppet stick. The puppet head is carved from pure wood; the puppet shoulder is made of softer wood such as pine and poplar; the puppet stick pole is divided into a middle pole and a hand pole. The middle pole is made of wood, about 1 meter long, with a pole diameter of 2 cm, and the hand pole is about 70 cm, all made of bamboo. When assembling in a row, first pass the middle pole through the hole in the shoulder and then insert it into the neck of the puppet head, and tie the head to the middle pole with a thin rope. Then use underwear to connect the shoulder and the hand pole, and finally put on outer clothes for the puppet character. There are many unique skills in the Yangxian stick puppet performance, mainly including: carrying water and changing shoulders, playing with gauze hats, military officers taking off hats, civil officials taking off hats, taking off clothes, playing with branches, playing with boots, blowing beards, etc., which are manipulated by the stick artists and completed by the puppet drama characters, which are very exquisite and lifelike. The Yangxian stick puppet show has a distinctive style, a combination of hardness and softness in singing, a thick and simple melody, a strong visual impact, superb performance skills, and a variety of unique skills, showing obvious originality, which is loved by local people. It is the second batch of intangible cultural heritage protection projects in Shaanxi Province.