Chinese Music

Chinese Music

1. Jiangnan Sizhu

   • Silk & Bamboo Ensemble
   • Played indoors by amateurs
     • e.g. teahouses
   • Highly participatory
     • Improvisatory
   • Instrumental
     • Leading
       • Dizi
         • Side-blown bamboo flute
         • Reed membrane (dimo) covering hole between blow hole and highest finger hhole
         • Flutter tonguing, double/triple tonguing, circular breathing
       • Erhu
         • 2 string bowed instrument
         • Wooden resonator covered with stretched snake skin
         • Bow between 2 srings
         • Heart-wenching
     • Yangqin
     • Pipa
       • 4 string pear-shaped lute
       • Plucked
       • 12-26 Frets made of steel/silk
       • fretted pitch bends, lunzhi (continuous strumming with all 5 fingrs)
     • Xiao
     • Sheng
       • Multi-reed mouth organ consisting of 13-17 bamboo pipes of different lengths mounted on a gourd shaped wooden base
       • Blow and suck in air
     • Sanxian
     • Drums
     • Cymbals
     • Guzheng
     • clapper
       • 2 piece of bamboos tied tgt
   • Need to be sensitive to the decorations of their colleagues
   • Pentatonic
   • Qupai (basic melody)
   • Heteropony

2. Guangdong Music

   • Shrill, Nasal sounding
   • Types
     • Xiaoqu
     • Yuequ
     • Operatic interludes
     • Instrumental ensemble music
   • Secular Entertainment
     • Weddings, Funerals, Accompanying music in operas
   • Instrumental
     • Sanjiiantou
       • Gaohu
         • Bowed string instrument developed from erhu
         • Brighter, lighter tone
         • Smaller resonator covered with snake skin placed between knees
         • Tremolo, vibrato, harmonics, pizz
       • Qinqin
         • Chinese lute with wooden body, slender fretted neck with 3 strings
       • Yangqin
         • Dulcimer
         • Wooden box with 20 sets of double or triple course metal strings stretched over bridges
         • Hitting strings with 2 bamboo hammer
         • 5 octaves
     • Yehu
       • Bowed string instrument
       • Sound box made from coconut shell covered with coconut wood
       • Lower in pitch
       • Temolo, vibrato, harmonics, pizz
     • Xiao
       • Vertical end-blown flute made of Bamboo
       • No reed membrane, gentler tone
       • Available in different keys
   • Heterophony
   • jiahua (embellishments)
   • Gong Che notation
   • Cipher notation