Music of China

Music of China appears to date back to the dawn of Chinese civilization, and documents and artifacts provide evidence of a well-developed musical culture as early as the Zhou Dynasty (1122 BC - 256 BC).

According to Mencius, a ruler had asked Mencius whether it was moral if he preferred popular music to the classics. The answer was that the only thing matters being whether or not he loved his subjects.

The Imperial Music Bureau, first established in the Qin Dynasty (221-207 BC), was greatly expanded under the Emperor Han Wu Di (140-87 BC) and charged with supervising court music and military music and determining what folk music would be officially recognized. In subsequent dynasties, the development of Chinese music was strongly influenced by foreign music, especially that of Central Asia.

Instrumentation

Chinese musicians at a restaurant in Shanghai

See also: Traditional Chinese musical instruments

Music in China is played on solo instruments or in small ensembles of plucked and bowed stringed instruments, flutes, and various cymbals, gongs, and drums. The scale has five notes. Bamboo pipes and qin are among the oldest known musical instruments from China; instruments are traditionally divided into categories based on their material of composition: skin, gourd, bamboo, wood, silk, earth/clay, metal and stone. Chinese orchestras traditionally consist of bowed strings, woodwinds, plucked strings and percussion. The oldest written music is Youlan or the Solitary Orchid, attributed to Confucius (see guqin article for a sample of tablature). The first major well-documented flowering of Chinese music was for the qin during the Tang Dynasty, though the qin is known to have been played since before the Han Dynasty.

In ancient China the position of musicians was much lower than that of painters (although music was seen as central to the harmony and longevity of the state). Therefore music theory was not very well developed since the Tang Dynasty. But almost every emperor took the folk songs seriously. They sent officers to collect the folk songs for inspecting the popular will. One of the Confucianist Classics, Shi Jing (poets), contained lots of folk songs during 800 BC to about 300 BC.

Re-enactment of a traditional music performance

Traditional orchestral instruments

• Woodwind and percussion
  • dizi, sheng, paigu, gong, paixiao, guan, bells, cymbals
• Bowed strings
  • erhu, zhonghu, dahu, banhu, jinghu, gaohu, gehu, yehu, cizhonghu, diyingehu, leiqin
• Plucked and struck strings
  • guqin, sanxian, yangqin, guzheng, ruan, konghou, liuqin, pipa, zhu

Chinese vocal music has traditionally been sung in a thin, nonresonant voice or in falsetto and is usually solo rather than choral. All traditional Chinese music is melodic rather than harmonic. Chinese vocal music probably developed from sung poems and verses with music.

History (Modern)

The New Culture Movement of the 1910s and 1920s evoked a great deal of lasting interest in Western music as a number of Chinese musicians who had studied abroad returned to perform Western classical music and to compose works of their own based on the Western musical notation system. Symphony orchestras were formed in most major cities and performed to a wide audience in the concert halls and on radio. Many of these performers added jazz influences to traditional music, adding xylophones, saxophones and violins, among other instruments. Lu Wencheng, Li Jinhui, Zhou Xuan, Qui Hechou, Yin Zizhong and He Dasha were among the most popular performers and composers during this period; many, especially Zhou Xuan, were criticized as pornographic and degenerate by Maoists. Popular music--greatly influenced by Western music, especially that of the United States--also gained a wide audience in the 1940s. After the 1942 Yan'an Forum on Literature and Art, a large-scale campaign was launched in the Communist controlled areas to adapt folk music to create revolutionary songs to educate the largely illiterate rural population on party goals. Musical forms considered superstitious or anti-revolutionary were repressed, and harmonies and bass lines were added to traditional songs. One example is The East Is Red, a folksong from northern Shaanxi which was adapted into a nationalist hymn. Of particular note is the composer, Xian Xinghai (1905-1945), who was active during this period and composed the Yellow River Cantata which is the best-known of all of his works. The contata was adapted to a piano concerto, the Yellow River Concerto, by the pianist Yin Chengzong in 1969, and is still performed today on stages of the world.

After the establishment of the People's Republic of China, revolutionary songs continued to be performed, and much of the remainder of popular music consisted of popular songs from the Soviet Union with the lyrics translated into Chinese. Symphony orchestras flourished throughout the country, performing Western classical music and compositions by Chinese composers. Conservatories and other institutions of musical instruction were developed and expanded in the major cities. A number of orchestras from Eastern Europe performed in China, and Chinese musicians and musical groups participated in a wide variety of international festivals.

During the height of the Cultural Revolution, musical composition and performance were greatly restricted. A form of soft, harmonic, generic, pan-Chinese music called guoyue was artificially created to be performed at conservatories. After the Cultural Revolution, musical institutions were reinstated and musical composition and performance revived.

The 1970s saw the rise of Cantopop in Hong Kong. It arose as a reaction against more traditional shidaiqu, and featured American soft rock and traditional Cantonese vocal styles. Joseph Koo, Lisa Wang, Adam Cheng, Lotus, Wynners and James Wong were especially popular. In the 1980s, singers began using Cantonese instead of English. This new generation of stars included Sam Hui, Danny Chan, Kenny Bee, Anita Mui, Aaron Kwok, Leon Lai, Andy Lau and Jacky Cheung. The last four were the biggest stars, and were referred to as "the four heavenly kings (of Cantopop)" (Cantonese: sei3 dai6 tin1 wong4). Newer teen idols include Sammi Cheng, Karen Mok and Eason Chan.

Parallel with the rise of Cantopop was Chinese Rock, which drew on earlier, underground pioneers like Taiwanese star Teresa Teng. The widely-acknowledged forefather of Chinese rock is Cui Jian. Modern rock artists include Tang Dynasty, Dadawa, Cobra, Dou Wei, Zhang Chu, He Yong, Zhinanzhen, Lingdian and Heibao. Musically, these range from New Wave (Lingdian) to heavy metal (Heibao), alongside punk rock bands like Catcher in the Rye and Dixiayinger.

In 1980 the Chinese Musicians' Association was formally elected to the International Musicological Society. Chinese musical groups toured foreign countries, and foreign musical organizations performed in China. In the mid-1980s popular ballads and Western folk and classical music still drew the greatest audiences, but other kinds of music, including previously banned Western jazz and rock and roll, were being performed and were receiving increasing acceptance, especially among young people.

History of Chinese heavy metal

See also: Chinese rock

Heavy metal in China is quite young. Everything started with the first rock star Cui Jian who has also already played in Germany together with Udo Lindenberg (2000 and 2002) and toured the US several times.

In the late 1980s Cui Jian played the first Chinese rock song called: "I Have Nothing" ("Yi wu suo you"). It was the first time that an electric guitar was used in China. Cui Jian became the most famous performer of the time. His socially critical lyrics earned him the anger of the government and many of his concerts were banned or cancelled. After the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 he played with a red scarf around his head to demonstrate against the actions of the government. At present the situation is calm and he often performs together with foreign acts in Beijing and Shanghai.

Following on two bands became famous throughout all of China: Hei Bao (Black Panther) and Tang Dynasty. Both started during the late 1980s and early 1990s.

Black Panther is an old-school rock band whose first CD, Hei Bao used English songs ("Don't Break My Heart") that became popular throughout China. They are still playing (as of 2004) even though their first singer (Dou Wei) left the band after the first CD and successfully started a solo career.

As with most Chinese rock bands, they had to release their CDs in Taiwan or Hong Kong first, as no record company in Mainland China wanted to release it. Normally it took one year before the CDs were released officially in Mainland China.

Tang Dynasty was the first heavy metal band of China. Its first CD "A Dream Return to Tang Dynasty" combines elements of traditional Chinese opera and old school heavy metal. It was released 1991/2 and was a major breakthrough for Tang Dynasty. Unfortunately, one member of Tang Dynasty died shortly after the release.

Around 1994-96: the first thrash metal band was formed: Chao Zai (Overload) has released three CDs, the last one in cooperation with Gao Chi (a pop rock singer) of the disbanded hard rock band The Breathing.

In the 90s the new wave of American grunge music reached China and influenced the youth, so that the face of Kurt Cobain is still omnipresent at concerts / students.

Punk became famous in China around 1994 - 1996 (first Chinese punker: He Yong) and was succeeded by nu-metal (influenced by Limp Bizkit, Linkin Park, others).

Around 1995 the first wave of Chinese punk bands appeared in Beijing, whereas the second generation followed around 1997.

Until the end of the 90s, when foreign bands, such as Korn, Limp Bizkit or Linkin Park became known in China, dozens of Nu-Metal bands developed within China:

Ye Cha (Yaksa) - Thrash Nu-Metal / Rapcore - 2 CDs, Twisted Machine - Rapcore / Thrash Nu-Metal - 2 CDs, AK 47 - Hardcore Nu-Metal, Overheal Tank - Nu-Metal

Going on to the first years of the new millennium (2000-2004), post punk and extreme metal entered the Underground scene and is ascending among the fans.

During 2003, SARS struck in China and cut deep into the social daily life of many Chinese. Dead streets, closed bars, canceled concerts and events were the result. It also struck the metal scene as it was impossible to perform in any city. The major bars were closed or didn't allow shows, bands had no chance to present themselves, business went down and some broke up.

In 2004-2005, Beijing's Joyside went on their first tour of China. American Filmmaker Fritz followed them to make the film Wasted Orient. This film is China's version of Decline Of Western Civilization.

Even after SARS was over and tourism slowly reestablished, the scene was still in a paralysis. Some old bars had closed down, some changed their owners due to financial reasons and others lost their customers, the flair and the atmosphere. It would take time to heal the wounds of SARS and so every small step in the right direction was cheerfully anticipated, such as the first metal concert after SARS in Xi'an (206 and Thinkers, Pulse :: Bella Bar).

Ethnic Han music

The Han Chinese, who make up some 92% of the population of China, play heterophonic music in which the musicians play versions of a single melodic line. Percussion accompanies most music, dance and opera.

Instrumental music

Instrumental pieces played on an erhu or dizi are popular, and are often available outside of China, but the pipa and zheng music, which are more traditional, are more popular in China itself. The qin is perhaps the most revered instrument in China, even though very few people know what it is or seen and heard one being played. The zheng, a form of zither, is most popular in Henan, Chaozhou, Hakka and Shandong. The pipa, a kind of lute, believed to have been introduced from the Arabian Peninsula area during the 6th century and improved, is most popular in Shanghai and surrounding areas.

Folk music

Han folk music thrives at weddings and funerals and usually includes a form of oboe called a suona and percussive ensembles called chuigushou. The music is diverse, sometimes jolly, sometimes sad and often based on Western pop music and TV theme songs. Ensembles consisting of mouth organs (sheng), shawms suona , flutes (dizi)and percussion instruments (especially yunluo gongs) are popular in northern villages; their music is descended from the imperial temple music of Beijing, Xi'an, Wutai shan and Tianjin. Xi'an drum music consisting of wind and percussive instruments is popular around Xi'an, and has received some popularity outside China in a highly-commercialized form. Another important instrument is the sheng, bamboo pipes, which is an ancient instrument that is an ancestor of all Western free reed instruments, such as the accordion. Parades led by Western-type brass bands are common, often competing in volume with a shawm/chuigushou band.

In southern Fujian and Taiwan, Nanyin or Nanguan is a genre of traditional ballads. They are sung by a woman accompanied by a xiao and a pipa and other traditional instruments. The music is generally sorrowful and mourning and typically deals with love-stricken women. Further south, in Shantou, Hakka and Chaozhou, erxian and zheng ensembles are popular.

Sizhu ensembles use flutes and bowed or plucked string instruments to make harmonious and melodious music that has become popular in the West among some listeners. These are popular in Nanjing and Hangzhou, as well as elsewhere along the southern Yangtze area. Sizhu has been secularized in cities but remains spiritual in rural areas.

Jiangnan Sizhu (silk and bamboo music from Jiangnan) is a style of instrumental music, often played by amateur musicians in teahouses in Shanghai, that has become widely known outside of its place of origin.

Guangdong Music or Cantonese Music is instrumental music from Guangzhou and surrounding areas. It is based on Yueju (Cantonese Opera) music, together with new compositions from the 1920s onwards. Many pieces have influences from jazz and western music, using syncopation and triple time.

Opera

File:Chinese opera051.jpg

1800s opera scene

Main article: Chinese opera

Chinese opera has been hugely popular for centuries, especially Beijing opera. The music is often guttural with high-pitched vocals, usually accompanied by suona, jinghu, other kinds of string instruments, and percussion. Other types of opera include clapper opera, Pingju, Cantonese opera, puppet opera, Kunqu, Sichuan opera, Qinqiang, ritual masked opera and Huangmei xi.

Minorities

China has many ethnic groups besides the Han, concentrated in the southeast and northwest. These include Tibetans, Russians, Uyghurs, Manchus, Zhuang, Dai, Naxi, Miao, Wa, Yi, Lisu and Mongolians.

Tibet

Main article: Music of Tibet

Tibet is a culturally and ethnically distinct area in southwestern China. Its political status is highly controversial, with many within Tibet, as well as internationally, supporting independence. One of the major reasons for this sovereignty movement is that the Chinese Cultural Revolution decimated Tibetan culture, closing most of the area's monasteries, which were the centers for cultural and religious innovation. There are significant minorities of Tibetans in Kham, Bhutan, Nepal and India, as well as in immigrant communities throughout the world.

Music forms an integral part of Tibetan Buddhism. While chanting remains perhaps the best known form of Tibetan Buddhist music, complex and lively forms are also widespread. Monks use music to recite various sacred texts and to celebrate a variety of festivals during the year. The most specialized form of chanting is called yang, which is without metrical timing and is dominated by resonant drums and sustained, low syllables. Other forms of chanting are unique to Tantra as well as the four main monastic schools: Gelugpa, Kagyupa, Nyingmapa and Sakyapa. Of these schools, Gelugpa is considered a more a restrained, classical form, while Nyingmapa is widely described as romantic and dramatic. Gelugpa is perhaps the most popular.

Secular Tibetan music survived the Cultural Revolution more intact than spiritual music, especially due to the Tibetan Institute of Performing Arts, which was founded by the Dalai Lama shortly after his self-imposed exile. TIPA originally specialized in the operatic lhamo form, which has since been modernized with the addition of Western and other influences. Other secular genres include nangma and toshe, which are often linked and are accompanied by a variety of instruments designed for highly-rhythmic dance music. Nangma karaoke is popular in modern Lhasa. A classical form called gar is very popular, and is distinguished by ornate, elegant and ceremonial music honoring dignitaries or other respected persons.

Tibetan folk music includes a cappella lu songs, which are distinctively high in pitch with glottal vibrations, as well as now rare epic bards who sing the tales of Gesar, Tibet's most popular hero.

Tibetan music has influenced the pioneering compositions of Philip Glass and, most influentially, Henry Eichheim, most influentially. Later artists made New Age fusions by pioneers Henry Wolff and Nancy Hennings. These two collaborated on Tibetan Bells, perhaps the first fusion of New Age and Tibetan influences, in 1971. Glass' Kundun soundtrack proved influential in the 1990s, while the popularity of Western-adapted Buddhism (exemplified by Richard Gere, Yungchen Lhamo, Steve Tibbetts, Choying Drolma, Lama Karta and Kitaro and Nawang Khechong) helped further popularize Tibetan music.

With the arrival of Tibetan refugees in the Himalayas, Western music, often in unique Tibetan forms, started to become popular among Tibetans everywhere. Rangzen Shonu quickly became the most popular ethnically Tibetan performers of Western rock and pop. Other forms of imported pop music include Indian ghazal and filmi, popular across the Himalayas and in Tibetan communities worldwide. Tibetan-Western fusions have been long suppressed in China itself, but have been widespread and innovative outside of the country. In the mid- to late 1980s, a relaxation of governmental rules allowed a form of Tibetan pop music to emerge in Tibet proper. Direct references to native religion is still forbidden, but commonly-understood metaphors are widespread. Pure Tibetan pop is heavily influenced by light Chinese rock, and includes best-sellers like Jampa Tsering and Yatong. Politically and socially aware songs are rare in this form of pop, but commonplace in a second type of Tibetan pop. Nangma karaoke bars appeared in 1998 and are common in Lhasa, in spite of threats from the Chinese government.

External link:

• Review of _Tibetan Buddhist Rites from the Monasteries of Bhutan_ Lyrichord by Michael Monhart

Guangxi

Main article: Music of Guangxi

Yunnan

Nakhi musicians

Main article: Music of Yunnan

Yunnan is an ethnically diverse area in southeast China. Perhaps best-known from the province is the lusheng, a type of mouth organ, used by the Miao people of Guizhou for pentatonic antiphonal courting songs.

The Hani of Honghe Prefecture are known for a unique kind of choral, micro-tonal rice-transplanting songs.

The Nakhi of Lijiang play a type of song and dance suite called baisha xiyue, which was supposedly brought by Kublai Khan in 1253. Nakhi Dongjing is a type of music related to southern Chinese forms, and is popular today.

Sichuan

Main article: Music of Sichuan

Sichuan is a province in southwest China. Its capital city, Chengdu, is home to the only musical higher education institution in the region, the Sichuan Conservatory of Music. The province has a long history of Sichuan opera.

Manchuria

Main article: Music of Manchuria

Manchuria is a region in northeast China, inhabited by ethnic groups like the Manchu. The most prominent folk instrument is the octagonal drum, while the youyouzha lullaby is also well-known.

Xinjiang

Main article: Music of Xinjiang

Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region is dominated by Uyghurs, a Turkic people related to others from Central Asia. The Uyghurs' best-known musical form is the On Ikki Muqam, a complex suite of twelve sections related to Uzbek and Tajik forms. These complex symphonies vary wildly between suites in the same muqam, and are built on a seven-note scale. Instruments typically include dap (a drum), dulcimers, fiddles and lutes; performers have some space for personal embellishments, especially in the percussion.

The most important performer is Turdi Akhun, who recorded most of the muqams in the 1950s.

Hua'er

Hua'er is a type of song prevalent throughout northwest China. The informal music is often competitive in nature, with singers interacting and improvising topical and love lyrics, usually unaccompanied.

Kuaiban

Kuaiban is a type of rhythmic talking and singing which is often performed with percussive instruments such as hand clackers. The center of kuaiban tradition is Shandong province. Kuaiban bears some resemblance to rap and other forms of rhythmic music found in other cultures.

See also

• Chinese classical music
• Chinese rock
• Chinese musicology
• Music of Taiwan
• Traditional Chinese musical instruments
• World music
• Yayue
• CHIME Conference

External links

• Listen to traditional Chinese music
• The Internet Chinese Music Archive
• Chinese Popular Songs
• Detailed Archive about Chinese Rock Music in English
• Detailed History of Rock in China
• Heavy Metal Magazine from China: Painkiller Mag

References

• Jones, Steven. "The East Is Red... And White"". 2000. In Broughton, Simon and Ellingham, Mark with McConnachie, James and Duane, Orla (Ed.), World Music, Vol. 2: Latin & North America, Caribbean, India, Asia and Pacific, pp 34-43. Rough Guides Ltd, Penguin Books. ISBN 1-85828-636-0
• Rees, Helen with Zingrong, Zhang and Wei, Li. "Sounds of the Frontiers". 2000. In Broughton, Simon and Ellingham, Mark with McConnachie, James and Duane, Orla (Ed.), World Music, Vol. 2: Latin & North America, Caribbean, India, Asia and Pacific, pp 44-48. Rough Guides Ltd, Penguin Books. ISBN 1-85828-636-0
• Lee, Joanna. "Cantopop and Protest Singers". 2000. In Broughton, Simon and Ellingham, Mark with McConnachie, James and Duane, Orla (Ed.), World Music, Vol. 2: Latin & North America, Caribbean, India, Asia and Pacific, pp 49-59. Rough Guides Ltd, Penguin Books. ISBN 1-85828-636-0
• Trewin, Mark. "Raising the Roof". 2000. In Broughton, Simon and Ellingham, Mark with McConnachie, James and Duane, Orla (Ed.), World Music, Vol. 2: Latin & North America, Caribbean, India, Asia and Pacific, pp 254-261. Rough Guides Ltd, Penguin Books. ISBN 1-85828-636-0