Mongolian Morin Khuur Music
01 · Historical Records
There is a deep relation of origin between the horse-head fiddle and another Mongol instrument, the hubo-si: the hubo-si first evolved into the Nomentu hubo-si, then into the chaowu'er, and finally into the horse-head fiddle.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
The horse-head fiddle is a bowed string instrument peculiar to the Mongol people, called “chaor” in Mongol and named for the horse's head carved at the head of the instrument. The Gorlos horse-head fiddle music is widely current among the Mongol people of the Qian Gorlos Mongol autonomous county of Jilin, and its influence reaches the neighbouring cities and counties of Qian'an and Changling. Apart from formal occasions, the horse-head fiddle is also played at folk weddings and ceremonies and at gatherings of relatives and friends; it can both accompany and play solo and has a rich national character. The horse-head fiddle consists of the sound box, the neck, the strings, the tuning pegs and the bow. The neck is made of pear wood or rosewood, the largest being 124 centimetres long and the smallest 70. The sound box is mostly in the form of an upright or inverted trapezoid, and there are also hexagonal and octagonal ones. The frame is made of hard wood and covered on both faces with horse, ox or sheep skin, painted with patterns; some have a thin pine board on the back and sound holes at the two sides. At the upper part of the neck there is one tuning peg on the left and one on the right; the bow takes a rattan rod strung with horse hair, and two strands of horse hair serve as the strings, tuned in perfect fourths or perfect fifths. In performance the left hand holds the instrument and stops the strings while the right hand draws the bow, and there is often call for such bowing methods as the stopped bow, struck bow, broken bow, fight bow and spiccato together with such left-hand techniques as vibrato, portamento, double stopping, plucking and harmonics. The principle of sound production of the horse-head fiddle and the fingering and bowing of its technique have very rich content, and at the same time differ greatly from every kind of string instrument at home and abroad. The traditional pieces of the horse-head fiddle mostly evolved from folk songs and may be divided into five kinds: 1. native folk songs, such as Zhu Se Lian and Ba Ya Ling; 2. the named tunes of heroic epics, such as The Galloping Horse Tune and The Battle Tune; 3. the horse-step tunes, chiefly tunes representing the image of a fine horse; 4. qin pieces developed from folk songs, such as He Yin Hua and Modelei; 5. traditional Han Chinese tunes, such as The Pu'an Incantation and Liu Qing Niang. In recent decades the development of horse-head fiddle music has met with serious difficulties.
Zhu Se Lian
One of the native folk songs among the traditional pieces of the horse-head fiddle.
Ba Ya Ling
One of the native folk songs among the traditional pieces of the horse-head fiddle.
The Five Kinds of Traditional Repertory
The five kinds: native folk songs, the named tunes of heroic epics, horse-step tunes, qin pieces developed from folk songs and ancient Han Chinese tunes.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
The traditional pieces of the horse-head fiddle mostly evolved from folk songs and may be divided into five kinds.
Other submitting regions for the same item: Mongolian Morin Khuur Music · Mongolian Morin Khuur Music.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
The horse-head fiddle is extremely revered among the Mongol people and has become an important form of expression of Mongol culture, possessing research value in Mongol cultural history and folklore. The four great performing schools in the history of the horse-head fiddle each had their own traditional repertory, but today the transmitters grow fewer and fewer and the loss of pieces in every school is serious, so that protection brooks no delay.
05 · Associated Representative Bearers
Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:
- Qi Baoligao 02-0273
- Bulin 03-0836
- Baoyuming
- Qinggelei
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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