Chinese Classical Music

By: Vicky WuIB Music

Religion and MusicOFor several thousands of years,

Chinese culture was dominated by the teachings of the philosopher Confucius, who conceived of music in the highest sense as a means of calming the passions and of dispelling unrest and lust, rather than as a form of amusement.

ToneO Most Chinese music is based on the five-

tone or heptatonic scale, thee scale was much used in older music while seven- tone or the pentatonic scale is often encountered in northern Chinese folk music.

O The notes used in Chinese classical music of the heptatonic scale are C,D,E,G,A.

Categorization

OChinese music instruments can be categorized into eight classes by the materials they are made from. There they are: metal, stone, clay, leather, silk, wood, bottle-gourd and bamboo.

Silk

O Silk refers to the stringed instruments.O It can be further divided into three

categories: the bowed strings, the plunked strings and the struck strings.

O Ex: pipa, guzheng, guqing, erhu and dulcimer.

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The pluncked instrument: Guzheng There are many techniques used

in the playing of the guzheng, including basic plucking actions at

the right portion and pressing actions at the left portion (by the

left hand to produce pitch ornamentations and vibrato) as

well as tremolo (right hand).

The bowed strings instrument: Erhu

It has widely been called "Chinese violin" because its tone

similar to a Western violin. While the four-string violin is played horizontally, the two-

string erhu is played vertically.

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WoodO The wood type instruments includes wo

oden blocks and wooden boxes.O These were used by Buddhist monks dur

ing religious ceremonies. O They hit the wooden box with a wooden

stick.

Bottle-gourdO The most famous gourd type instruments

are Sheng and Hulusi.

O Sheng is one of the oldest Chinese instrument, it imitates the sound of a phoenix.

O Hulusi is held vertically and has three bamboo pipes which pass through a gourd wind chest.

ClayO The ocarina, a small, egg-shaped wind

instrument with six holes for the finger tips is made out of clay.

O It is one of the oldest Chinese instruments.

BambooO The majority of woodwind instruments are

made from bamboo.O Ex. Bamboo lute, panpipes and reed pipe.

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Leather

•Leather refers to the beast leather instrument, which often times also means the beating drum.•One example would be the waist drum.

MetalO This includes bells, luo and bo.

StoneO The instument that is made of stone is cal

led: bianqing.O It is a ancient percssion instrument, vario

us size of stones hang on a wooden stand.

PerformanceO music in China is played on solo instruments or i

nsmall ensembles of plucked and bowed stringed instruments, flute and various cymbals, gong,

and drums.

04/19/23

The end Thank you for lis

tening