Chinese Music History of Chinese music

Chinese music is an important art form-the richness of Chinese civilization. The origins of Chinese music can be traced back to approximately 8000 years ago. European music was experiencing its first rustlings of life, at the same time, a complete musical theory and sophisticated musical instruments began to appear in China, owing largely to the orthodox ritual music advocated by Confucius. The long history of Chinese music started with the earliest wind instruments-16 vertical bone flutes which were found in Henan province in 1985. Two famous theories saw a splendid Chinese history of over 2000 years' exploration in musical theory. The first complete music theory Theory of Increase and Decrease in Trisection came into being at the middle of the Spring & Autumn Annals (770 B.C. - 476 B.C.) in ancient China. By the Han Dynasty (206 B.C. - 220 A.D.), the imperial court had set up a Music bureau which was in charge of gathering and editing ancient tunes and folk songs. By the time of the Tang Dynasty (713 755 A.D.) the court organized the Pear Garden Academy song and dance troupe which cultivated a large number of musicians, this then laid a firm foundation for Chinese music, and even other music-related art like folk songs, drama, opera. Duodenary Law of Averages, created by Zhu Zaiyu (a royal member) in the Ming dynasty (1368-1644), became a symbol of the highest music achievement in China. In the course of the development, all kinds of professional musical instruments were produced, classified and used. Lastly, the achievement of music laid a solid base for Chinese and other arts related to music. During (6000 BC - 1711 BC) at that time, the earliest wind instruments like vertical bone flutes, 'xun' (pottery musical instrument) were used to play as accompaniment to singing and dancing in hunting activity. Also, some percussion instruments were put into use. Early Qin 1711 BC - 256 BC- Chinese music reached the first height during this period. Percussion instruments such as carillons, bronze bells, drums and Qing (instrument made of metals or stone chimes) were popularly used in playing music. The instruments feature grandeur sound effect and ringing sonority of produced grand features for Chinese music. Then stringed instruments like ancient Qin and Se (a twenty-five-stringed plucked instrument, somewhat similar to zither) came out as a kind of solo tool. In the Chou dynasty (c. 1027-256 BC) music was one of the four subjects for noble man to study. Although much of the repertoire has been lost, some old Chinese ritual music (Yayue) is preserved in manuscripts. Qin to Tang Dynasty 221 BC 960 AD- During the Qin dynasty (221-206 BC) music was denounced as a wasteful pastime; Almost all musical books, instruments, and manuscripts were ordered destroyed. Despite this severe setback Chinese music experienced a renaissance during the Han dynasty (206 BC-AD 220), when a special bureau of music was established to take charge of ceremonial music. Here came a full height of Chinese music. A number of musical instruments were introduced into China from foreign country because of cultural exchange. The wide spread of stringed instruments and music notes for stringed instrument made Chinese secular music (Suyue) reach its peak at that time. Pi Pa played a leading role in royal/imperial court music which was typical form in Tang dynasty (618-906).

At the end of this period, one of the most important Chinese musical instruments Er Hu (in Chinese Pinyin, means two-string instrument) came out. Song to Qing Dynasty 960 1840It is a very important time for bow and string instruments. The wide use of the instruments promoted the development of Chinese drama and opera. The operas were based on old tales of heroes and the supernatural. The first fully developed form of Chinese opera, called northern drama, or Beiqu, emerged during the Yuan dynasty (1279-1368). During the Ming (1368-1644) and Qing (1644-1912) dynasties, southern drama, also called Xiwen, flourished and underwent much stylistic development. The variety of Chinese opera known as Peking opera, Jingxi, is the most familiar in the West. It developed in the 19th century as a synthesis of earlier provincial forms. Moreover, with the occurrence of Suona (a kind of wind instrument) and gong such kinds of instruments, folk music came into popularity instead of court music. Contemporary Period (1912 - now) during the first half of the 20th century Chinese music was considerably influenced by the music of the West. Three major schools of thought arose in response to this influence. The first school aimed at reviving the old thousand-piece orchestras that once delighted ancient princes and sages and resisted the influence of Western music. The second school concerned itself almost exclusively with Western music. The last school of Chinese music took great pride in traditional Chinese musical culture but did not hesitate to apply it to Western techniques of composition and performance. During the 1950s Western influences penetrated Chinese music to an unprecedented extent. In contemporary China notable facilities exist for the training of musicians in both Chinese and Western styles. Many symphonic orchestras and Chinese-style instrumental ensembles exist, and large choral groups are commonly found in large cities, universities, and factories. Both Chinese and Western instruments are manufactured in large quantities and are used in governmentmaintained schools and conservatories throughout the country.

Philosophy and Characteristics of Chinese music

For several thousand years Chinese culture was dominated by the Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism. Chinese people believe that sound influences the harmony of the universe and the power of vocal and instrumental music composed and played in the highest sense to purify one's thoughts, calm the passions, to dispel unrest and lust, rather than as a form of amusement. All such a particular expression can be found in the cult of the qin and flutes. First, Chinese music is somehow related to the tonality of Chinese language. Thus melody and tone color are prominent expressive features of Chinese music, and great emphasis is given to the proper articulation and inflection of each musical tone. The same pronunciation with different tones represents different meaning, depending on whether it is a flat tone, or sliding from a lower to higher pitch or from the higher to the lower, or a combination. There is same thing for Chinese music, thus it has more possibilities in tonality which is more sensitive and subtle. Most Chinese music is based on the five-tone, or pentatonic, scale, but the seven-tone, or pentatonic, scale, is also used, often as an expansion of a basically pentatonic core. The pentatonic scale was much used in older music. The pentatonic scale is often encountered in northern Chinese folk music.

Secondly, Classical Chinese music refers to the art music closely related with Chinese poetry. Therefore, it is not surprising that most of the classical pieces have very poetic and sometimes philosophical titles. Traditional classical music in this sense is intimately linked to poetry and to various forms of lyric drama and is more or less poetry without words. Thirdly, Classical Chinese music and traditional Chinese painting are twin sisters. Take, for instance, the traditional painting for landscapes: there is no obvious focus in the picture, but each part seems to have its own focus in such a manner that the variety of local character is in harmony with the whole picture, including the empty parts. In traditional Chinese painting, the empty parts are very important too in order to give the whole painting life. If everywhere were painted, there would be less freedom of imagination for the viewers in appreciating the painting. In another words, the appreciating of painting is an interactive and dynamic process between the viewers and painting. The same is true with classical Chinese music. Each phrase is one sentence followed by a certain silence in such a way that the variety of sounds and the silences (and sometimes noise) are combined harmoniously in forming the sound poetry, creating a kind of dynamic link between the performer and the audience. A good performer can create such a link so that the listeners can experience the power and the beauty of the music in a way like enjoying a beautiful poems and painting.

Traditional Chinese Musical Instruments

According to Ba Yin Method - the classification of materials used in their construction, Chinese musical instruments traditionally have been grouped into eight kinds: metal (carillons, bronze bells), stone chimes (Qing), pottery/clay (xun), leather/skin (drum), strings/silk (se, qin and cheng), wood, guard, and bamboo (flutes, yu, sheng). Of these, the stone and wood instruments are obsolete. The older instruments include long zithers; flutes; panpipes; the sheng, or mouth organ; and percussion instruments, such as clappers, drums, and gongs. Of later origin are various lutes and fiddles, introduced to China from Central Asia.

Erhu
Erhu is a kind of violin (fiddle) with two strings which, together with zhonghu, gaohu, sihu, etc, belongs to the "huqin" family. The sound body of the erhu is a drum-like little case usually made of ebony or sandalwood and snake skins. It usually has a hexagonal shape with the length of approximately 13 cm. The front opening is covered with skin of python (snake) and that of the back is left open. The functions of this case of resonance are to amplify the vibrations of the strings. The neck of the erhu is about 81 cm long and is manufactured with the same materials as the drum. The top of the stem is bent for

decoration. The two strings of the erhu is usually tuned D and A. The two tuning handles (pegs) are found close to the end of the stem. There are no frets (as contrast to the lute) or touching board (as contrast to violin). The player creates different pitches by touching the strings at various positions along the neck of the instrument. The strings are usually made of silk or nylon. Nowadays, metal strings are commonly used. The bow is 76 cm long and is manufactured of reed which one curves during cooking, and arched with horse hair in the same way as the bow of violin. However, in the case of erhu, the horse hair runs between the two strings. In another word, one cannot take off the bow from the instrument unless one of the two strings is taken off or broken. The posture which the player must adopt to play the erhu is the same as that adopted for the other kinds of huqin: the left hand holding the fiddle and the right hand, the bow. The erhu is put on the lap vertically, the left hand moves vertically to touch the strings for the right pitch while the left hand (with the bow) move horizontally to make the sound. The Erhu is mainly an instrument for melody in a sense like voice. The left hand slides up and down the instrument while fingers pressing the strings to create desired pitch and "sliding" effects. The right hand pushes the horse hair against this or that string while moving horizontally, to create the sounds on either of the two strings. Occasionally some musicians hold the instrument with the help of a rope, in the same way as for saxophone, in order to play standing or walking. However it doesn't look elegant with the sound body pressing against the belly of the performer and the stem of the instrument pointing up and outwards. Therefore, the musicians normally play sitted unless it's absolutely necessary. In the old days, street musicians often used this method in order to play while walking. Today, in some pop or rock bands, musicians use this method of playing in order to act on the stage. The erhu sounds similar to human voice, and can imitate many natural sounds such as birds and horse. It is a very expressive instrument, most well-known for playing melancholic tune, but also capable of play merry melody. The erhu often plays an important role in the national orchestras. In the smaller orchestras, there are usually 2 to 6 erhu, in larger ones, 10 with 12. In fact, the erhu plays the same role as the violin in the Western orchestras.

Guzheng
The Zheng, commonly known as Guzheng, (pronounced "Goo-Zheng"), is a plucked string instrument that is part of the zither family. It is one of the most ancient Chinese musical instruments according to the documents written in the Qin dynasty (before 206 BC). Zheng is the forerunner of Japanese koto, Korean kayagum, Mongolian yatag, and Vietnamese dan tranh. Due to its long history, the zheng has been called guzheng or GuZheng where "Gu" stands for "ancient" in Chinese. The guzheng has been a popular instrument since ancient times and is

considered as one of the main chamber as well as solo instruments of Chinese traditional music. Since the mid-19th century, guzheng solo repertoire has been growing and evolving towards an increasing technical complexity. The Chinese character for "zheng" composed of two parts: the upper part means "bamboo" and the lower part is "argue". According to a legend, there was a master of se, 25-stringed zither, who had two talented daughters who love playing the instrument. Now there came a time that the master became too old, and wanted to pass his instrument over to one of them. However, both daughters wanted to have it. The master felt miserable and finally, out of desperate, he decided to split the instrument into two - one got 12 strings, and the other 13. To his amazement, the new instrument sounds mellow and even more beautiful than its original one. The happy master gave the new instrument a new name "zheng" by making up the character with the symbolisms representing "bamboo" and "argue". The word "zheng", the name of this instrument, pronounces the same as the word "zheng" which means "argue" or "dispute". The origin of the Chinese character representing this instrument seems to indicate that the early version of the instrument was made of bamboo, which is different from that of today. However, this legendary story, though it might be true according to the origin of the Chinese character for this instrument, should not be taken too seriously. Zheng (Guzheng) is build with a special wooden sound body with strings arched across movable bridges along the length of the instrument for the purpose of tuning. In the early times the zheng had 5 string; later on developed into 12 to 13 strings in the Tang Dynasty (618 - 907AD) and 16 strings in the Song and Ming dynasty (from the 10th to 15th century). The present day zheng usually has 21-25 strings. The pitch of a given string is determined by the position of the bridge; therefore, Guzheng can in principle be tuned to any desired scales. Traditionally, pentatonic scale is used. The instrumentalist plucks the strings with the right hand and touches the strings with the left hand to produce the desired pitch and create subtle tones and ornaments (see the pictures with Liu Fang playing the Guzheng). Full scale can also be obtained by skillfully applying press on certain strings from the other side of the bridge with the left hand. Guzheng player attaches a little plectrum on each finger using a special tape. For traditional repertoires, the instrumentalist mostly uses three fingers of the right hand for plucking whereas the left hand pressing the string from the other side of the bridge to create special tonalities and ornaments. For some contemporary repertoires, both hands are needed to produce complicated harmonies using four fingers of each, which means that even the fingers of the left hand need to ware plectrums. In some cases, one can use cello bow to play on the Guzheng to produce sustained sounds and special effects. One can also use sticks to hit on the strings in the way like a percussion instrument.

Pipa

The pipa is a four stringed lute with a pearshaped body. Its short, bent neck has 30 frets which extend onto the soundboard, offering a wide range (3.5 octavos). This instrument appears in texts dating up to the second century B.C. There are a lot of written texts of the Han Dynasty (206 BC - 220 AD) about pipa music played and the stories that inspired the composition for those pipa pieces. Since the Tang Dynasty (618-907), the pipa is one of the most popular Chinese instruments, and has maintained its appeal in solo as well as chamber genres. The pipa technique is characterized by spectacular finger dexterity and virtuosi programmatic effects. Rolls, slaps, pizzicato, harmonics and noises are often combined into extensive tone poems vividly describing famous battles or other exciting scenes. The instrument is also capable of more lyrical effects in pieces inspired by poetry, landscapes and historical themes. Pipa music has been loved by Chinese people through centuries and there used to be a large repertoire of pipa music, a lot of them were lost, and some of them were handed down from generation to generation through individual artists and scholars. Traditionally pipa is mainly a solo instrument, some time played in folk ensembles such as traditional silk and bamboo ensembles that are common found in South-East China, or used to accompany story telling, or local opera. Nowadays, the pipa is more and more used in contemporary compositions for ensemble, orchestra, and various combinations with both Chinese and western instruments. The most outstanding works are pipa concertos with western orchestra.