Whitewashing Chinese music

The idea that Chinese performers on Chinese instruments playing Chinese music might be guilty of whitewashing seems preposterous, yet I'm going to suggest that whitewashing occurs here, and to no small extent.

Within China, over the past close to two centuries, with Westernisation of the Chinese society, European culture has become the idea of a representation of high culture, modern organisation, a system focused on scientific rigour and understanding. This perceptual shift is a widespread movement throughout various levels of the Chinese society and not restricted to music alone. Western science, western systems of thought, and even western musical systems were being hailed as advanced, as the direction the Chinese had to go in order to be a part of the modern world. This was understandable, with China losing out swathes of land and power since the Opium Wars to the Europeans. What was in the past an ancient and powerful civilisation was so reduced, it was inevitable the Chinese believed that a different way of government, education, philosophies, an entire different way of doing things had to be implemented for their civilisation to be on par with the rest of the world.

Music was no different. The early 20th century saw promotion of singing in schools, bringing music education to the younger generation of Chinese. What is known as school-songs (学堂乐歌) were in fact Westernised melodies with new lyrics. Music education reform was carried out by many idealistic individuals who had the opportunity to go abroad to further their studies. Having learnt the musical tradition of European art music and seeing its systematic organisation of theoretical knowledge, most of them wholeheartedly embraced these philosophies, believing that this was the reform that the Chinese culture needed. From the early 20th century onwards, music in China took on a whole new set of ideas, philosophies, aesthetics, and structure. This was not to say that traditional Chinese music was totally wiped out or that the philosophies and aesthetical ideas of the past few thousand years no longer influenced the people, but it was a fact that this new music from Europe impacted the ideas and musical culture of China significantly from the early 20th century.

While there is the constant revival, conservation and work done for the folk and classical traditions of China, it is an indisputable fact that a significant extent of the idea that people have of Chinese music is the music of the "Chinese orchestra". The development of the Chinese orchestra will not be detailed here but readers can be directed here for slightly more detailed description of its development.

With the basic premise of the Chinese orchestra modelled upon the symphony orchestra of European art music tradition, the aesthetics of how the sound should be like is gradually being influenced as well. The full Chinese orchestra set up as we know of now is not built from a single group of instruments from a particular folk instrumental ensemble, but from different kinds of ensembles all around China. One difficulty arising from this is the fact that these instruments were not built to blend together because they did not originate within the same ensemble in the first place.

Within folk instrumental ensembles, there are various instruments that have very unique sounds and it is precisely because of these unique sounds that contribute to the particular ensemble's defining characteristic. When they come together in the Chinese orchestra however, all these various characteristic sounding instruments unfortunately might not work very well together. In attempting to emulate the symphony orchestra, instruments are being grouped into four instrumental families, much like the instruments in the symphony orchestra. With the creation of these instrumental families, it is inevitable that people also tend to parallel them in comparison.

Take the bowed string section for example. Although both groups of instruments produce sound through the bowing of strings, the similarity pretty much ends there. While performers especially competitive young professional musicians fresh from years of gruelling training from the conservatory will like to emphasise that whatever the violin can do, so can the erhu, and that is quite true - almost all the violin techniques can be performed on the erhu, and there are numerous technically virtuosic pieces in the violin repertoire that have been played just as well by performers on the erhu - they are still fundamentally different instruments. The structure of the instruments are very different with the erhu sounding with a membrane versus the wooden soundboard of the violin. There is no fingerboard on the erhu as well and the angle the bow makes on the strings is different from that of a violin. With all these fundamental differences, it is a sad fact of life that many erhu performers still take the ability to perform virtuosic pieces from the violin repertoire as one of the important goals in erhu performance. While finding ways to challenge and break technical limits is important and always welcome, it is unfortunate that sometimes it overshadows other forms of achievement in the performance of a Chinese musical instrument.

Chinese instruments have been seen as being built less scientifically than western musical instruments. Although this idea is slowly changing, it is nevertheless a very deeply ingrained one. The idea of musical instruments from another culture being less "well-built" is hard to shake off when the standard is being set with the ability to perform pieces equivalent to the European art music repertoire in musical systems based on the European art music culture. Definitely it is a boost to the ego when one can say that one is able to perform a certain piece of music just as well on the erhu as any other good violinist can on the violin, it is unfortunate however that this in fact perpetuates the believe that for the musical culture of the Chinese to be good, one has to aspire towards the achievement of European art music standards. This in fact is a circularity that turns in on itself. Instrument makers and researchers are at the same time constantly developing various ways of improving on Chinese musical instruments and many of the improvements sought after are precisely how to make them "comparable" to western musical instruments. Making instruments whose sounds "blend" better together in the orchestra, trying to increase the instruments' resonance and sound (an erhu can never match a violin in terms of volume) and even experimenting with different materials for the instruments are some examples of these developments. The results are instruments that sound good in the orchestra, instruments which are easier to play, and so on, and these are definitely welcome for performers. But at the same time, isn't "sounding good in an orchestra" a very Eurocentric point of view? What does a "good sound" imply?

All these build up an extremely intricate web that is very difficult to unravel. With the development of the Chinese orchestra being so influenced by European art music, the direction musical aesthetics of the Chinese orchestra takes has already been set, from the early days. While not set in stone, it is still a direction which, unless the entire performance practice of the Chinese orchestra were to change radically, is still going to be moving in the same general course. Yet at the same time, even with its borrowing of all the European traditions, there are elements that are different. While I argue that the whitewashing of Chinese music is a matter of historical fact, I am also at the same time, believing that music, art, and culture are always evolving, and always borrowing from other traditions and cultures. With communications and huge ease of accessibility, this is going to be even more so in the current time. And that should not be something to be feared but recognised. Influences should be acknowledged and new developments embraced.

The Butterfly Lovers Concerto

At a reader's request, here is some information about one of the most famous violin concertos in Chinese music.

The 1940s - 1950s was a period of great changes in China's modern history. With the end of the Second World War, the Chinese Civil War between the Chinese Communist Party and the Kuomintang resumed until finally in 1949 when the Kuomintang pulled out of the mainland and relocated to Taipei. Left in control of mainland China, the Communist Party of China proclaimed the formation of the People's Republic of China.

A series of campaigns and plans shaped the newly formed People's Republic of China. First came the "Hundred Flowers Campaign" (百花运动) in which the citizens were encouraged to openly express their opinions of the communist regime and differing views and solutions to national policy were being encouraged. In line with this, artists were also encouraged to rethink traditional arts and music, to modernise the existing art and culture with new knowledge from the West, and at the same time, retain China's cultural and artistic characteristics.

The economic and social plan known as the "Great Leap Forward" (大跃进) that followed aimed to transform the country from an agrarian economy into a communist society through rapid industrialisation and collectivisation unfortunately resulted in widespread famine. However, it not only changed the economical landscape but also the social landscape of the country. Religions and mystic institutions were abolished and being replaced with political meetings and propaganda sessions. There were also attempts to improve education in the rural areas and the status of women, as well as many feudalistic practices that were rampant in the past.

From the 1950s up until the end of the Cultural Revolution, educated youths were also being "rusticated" or "sent down" to the countryside, either willingly or under coercion, under the assertion that "the countryside is a vast expanse of heaven and earth where we can flourish".

"The Butterfly Lovers Concerto" grew out from this historical backdrop. Liu Pin (刘品), a secretary of the Communist Party's Oversight Branch who led a rusticating group which included the composer He Zhanhao to the countryside started the idea of composing a piece of music for the proletariats. Ideas of creating something which the masses could appreciate and enjoy was being thrown up. Instead of the violin being an instrument which plays only Western classical music, a genre which probably speaks to only a select group of elite, they wanted to create a piece of music for the violin which can speak to the masses. Hence an experimental group was being formed amongst these students.

The composer He Zhanhao, having played the erhu in a yueju (越剧) troupe (a form of Chinese opera found around Shanghai), naturally took to the violin very quickly and was one of the more outstanding youths in the group. Hence in preparation for the 10th anniversary of the formation of the People's Republic of China, when a gift was being suggested to commemorate this occasion, he was being asked to compose a large scale piece of music in accordance with these ideals.

Being inexperienced in composition, He Zhanhao found himself in a fix. Even though he was motivated and interested in writing something, he found that he did not know where to start. It was only until after the encouragement of Liu Pin, who reminded him that he had plenty of music within himself, all the music from the operas that he was so familiar with was there, that He Zhanhao realised where he could draw his inspiration from.

With this plan underway, Liu Pin explained the situation to the assistant head of the Shanghai Conservatory of music Ding Shan De (丁善德) who then roped one of the composition students of the conservatory, Chen Gang, into the composition group. As told by He Zhanhao on the 50th anniversary of this composition, the names being put up as composers for this piece of music was decided by the leaders, with He Zhanhao as the first composer and Chen Gang as the second. However, there were also other people who were instrumental in the creation of this piece of work whose names were not being mentioned, such as Ding Zhi Nuo (丁芷诺), the daughter of Ding Shan De.

"The Butterfly Lovers Concerto" is a single-movement work in sonata form. Based upon the legend of "The Butterfly Lovers", the piece is divided into 3 main sections, corresponding also to the sections within the sonata form, the exposition; development; and recapitulation.

Explaining how they worked together in the compositional process, He Zhanhao said that he would first write down the solo violin melody in sections and bring to Chen Gang. Being a composition student and well-versed in arranging for an orchestra and accompanying instruments, Chen Gang would look through the melodies and when they were both satisfied with the melody, orchestrate it.

"The Butterfly Lovers Concerto" is a violin work which derives many musical materials from traditional Chinese music. While using Western compositional techniques, Western instruments and playing techniques, it brings out melodies and ideas which are familiar to the common people in China. The opening melody of the concerto

for example, is an interlude which is often found in yueju.

The bridge material of the exposition

is also another interlude used in many different places in yueju.

Operatic techniques of "jin da man chang" (紧打慢唱), in which the percussion and accompanying instruments play a regular, usually fast and intense rhythm while the melodic instruments (singing or solo instrument) play a slower, rhythmically free melody, are also being utilised.

Finally in 27 May 1959, this pioneering work in Chinese music, "The Butterfly Lovers Concerto" was being premiered in Shanghai by the violinist Yu Li Na (俞丽拿). In combining Western instruments and forms with Chinese sounds and ideas, it reflected the ideals the Chinese had at that time, to absorb new ideas from the West and at the same time, to retain their own characteristics.

Wildly popular since the first performance, this concerto has since been transcribed for many other different instruments and also for a Chinese orchestra.


References:
Chen Ming Zhi ed. Zhong Yue Yin Nin Geng Dong Ting - Min Zu Guan Xian Yue Dao Shang (Vol 2). "中樂因您更動聽－民族管弦樂導賞(下冊). Hong Kong: San Lian Shu Dian, 2003.

Yang Cheng Wan Bao (羊城晚报). 9 August 2009. http://news.ycwb.com/2009-08/09/content_2214928.htm

Chinese Orchestral Music

Most people nowadays may get their first introduction to Chinese music through the Chinese orchestra.

As a result, many might think that "classical" or traditional Chinese music is music of the Chinese orchestra.

This however, is not so.

Before the development of the Chinese Orchestra, there are various ensembles present around China. These ensembles are endemic - they play the music of their particular area. Some may be specialized in performing for religious rites, while others are opera troupes, court musicians, and so on.

The Chinese Orchestra as we know of it now, is a very recent invention, dating back to less than a century ago.

At the beginning of the twentieth century, China began to open her doors to the rest of the world.

Of course, before the turn of the century, there are missionaries and a few others from the west who brought Western music into China, but these were isolated people and events.

It was only after the turn of the century that western music really began to infiltrate the country, both from musicians from the west, as well as Chinese musicians who furthered their studies abroad.

The modern Chinese Orchestra could be traced back to the silk and bamboo ensembles (絲竹樂隊) from the southern part of China. In 1920, the Shanghai Da Tong musical group (上海大同樂會) was formed originally to revive music of the scholars (雅樂).

However, in 1925, Liu Yao Zhang (柳堯章) rearranged Xunyang Yue Ye (潯陽月夜) into the orchestral version Chun Jiang Hua Yue Ye (春江花月夜) which sparked off the development of new orchestral music.

In 1935, the former Central Broadcasting, Music Section, Folk Music Ensemble (中央廣播電台音樂組民樂隊) was formed, originally for the performance of Cantonese and Jiangnan Silk and Bamboo music. It was later expanded to include music from the northern parts of China as well, and by 1942, the structure of the ensemble has evolved with musicians for each of the four main sections of the orchestra - the wind, bowed, plucked and percussion instruments.

After the War of Liberation in 1949, many new ensembles sprung up.

In the Central Broadcasting Folk Music Orchestra, there came an important figure who stepped into the role of its conductor in the 1950s.

Peng Xiu Wen (彭修文) was instrumental in changing the face of the Chinese Orchestra into what we know of it now. He composed many new pieces and rearranged many other traditional tunes for the orchestra. He also started researching and developing the traditional instruments so that their sound becomes bigger, that they are able to sound well together, and at the same time, that the unique sound of the traditional instruments are not lost.

The Cultural Revolution that came in 1966 sadly, brought this rapid growth to a virtual standstill.

Through the 10 years of the Cultural Revolution, only a few pieces of orchestral music were produced and these were also mainly derived from music of the model operas (樣板戲) or revolutionary songs.

After the end of the Cultural Revolution, growth of the Chinese Orchestra slowly picked up again.

From the 80s onwards, Chinese Orchestras multiplied. New pieces are churned out endlessly for the orchestra.

Most provinces of China, where there once were only folk ensembles endemic to the area, each has a Chinese Orchestra as well.

And most of the pieces that we hear nowadays, even if they may be derived from traditional folk melodies, are played by modern Chinese orchestras, on modern Chinese orchestral instruments.

 

 

References: Zhong Guo Yin Yue Ci Dian. "中國音樂詞典-續編". Beijing: Ren Min Yin Yue Chu Ban She, 2001. Wang Yu He. Zhong Guo Jin Xian Dai Yin Yue Shi. "中國進現代音樂史". Beijing: Ren Min Yin Yue Chu Ban She, Hua Yue Chu Ban She, 2002. Chen Ming Zhi ed. Zhong Yue Yin Nin Geng Dong Ting - Min Zu Guan Xian Yue Dao Shang (Vol 1). "中樂因您更動聽－民族管弦樂導賞(上冊). Hong Kong: San Lian Shu Dian, 2003.