Pipa Art · Chinese Craft Stories

01 · Historical Records

In the long course of its historical evolution the pipa underwent a transformation from being held horizontally and plucked with a plectrum to being held upright and played with the fingers. The Tang dynasty was the high period of the art of the horizontally held, plectrum-plucked pipa; by the Ming and Qing dynasties pipa artists had made great contributions to the composition of pipa pieces and especially of large suites, and many famous pipa playing schools had formed. In the 1930s Mr Liu Tianhua made bold reforms to the pipa and originated the thirteen-fret six-phase pipa. From the late Qing dynasty to the early Republican period the Yingzhou ancient-tune school produced such representative transmitters as Wang Dongyang, Huang Xiuting and Shen Zhaozhou. In 1916 Shen Zhaozhou compiled and published the score of the Yingzhou Ancient Tunes, containing forty-five pieces: twenty-two slow pieces such as Flying Flowers Touching the Green, seventeen fast pieces such as Venting a Grievance, five literary pieces such as Yearning for Spring, and one martial piece, Ambush from Ten Sides. In the 1940s the transmitters of the Yingzhou ancient-tune school in Chongming county — Yang Xudong, Zhou Nianwen and Zhao Zhishan — were outstanding in skill and were known together as the “Three Great Masters of the Pipa”.

02 · Core Techniques & Process

The pipa is an ancient plucked string instrument of China; the two characters “pipa” are first found in Xu Shen's Shuowen Jiezi of the Eastern Han. “Pi” and “ba” are two playing techniques of this traditional instrument, corresponding to what are now called “tan” (to pluck) and “tiao” (to strike upwards with the thumb); the instrument was named after the technique and was called “piba”, which was later written as “pipa”. From the Qin and Han to the Sui and Tang the pipa was the general name for a number of plucked string instruments. After the founding of the People's Republic of China the development of the pipa reached a new peak. Today, besides solo playing and the national instrumental ensemble, the pipa is also the principal instrument of such genres as Jiangnan sizhu, Guangdong music, Chaozhou xianshi and Fujian Nanyin. The pipa playing art of the Yingzhou ancient-tune school originated and has long been current on Chongming Island of Shanghai city, and has a history of more than three hundred years. At the end of the Ming dynasty and the beginning of the Qing dynasty, Jia Gongda, Fan Zhengkui, Li Liancheng, Song Huiyu and others blended the northern and southern pipa playing styles, taking over the old pieces while creating new ideas of their own, and gradually formed the Yingzhou ancient-tune school. The Yingzhou ancient-tune school requires of its pipa fingering that “the pinching be sparse but vigorous and the tremolo be dense but clear”, and holds that “slow playing must not break off, fast playing must not become confused; elegant and correct music must not sound too high and the beat must not be hurried”. Its tremolo is distinguished by the “outward-down stroke”; its timbre is fine and soft, it is good at expressing quiet, elegant feeling, and it shows a leisurely, delicate charm. In the music world of the country only eight to ten pieces of the Yingzhou ancient-tune school are played in teaching, so that for a school with forty-five pieces its full character cannot by any means be displayed as it should be.

Yingzhou Ancient Tunes

In 1916 Shen Zhaozhou compiled and published the score of the Yingzhou Ancient Tunes, containing forty-five pieces: twenty-two slow pieces such as Flying Flowers Touching the Green, seventeen fast pieces such as Venting a Grievance, five literary pieces such as Yearning for Spring, and one martial piece, Ambush from Ten Sides.

Flying Flowers Touching the Green

In 1916 Shen Zhaozhou compiled and published the score of the Yingzhou Ancient Tunes, containing forty-five pieces: twenty-two slow pieces such as Flying Flowers Touching the Green, seventeen fast pieces such as Venting a Grievance, five literary pieces such as Yearning for Spring, and one martial piece, Ambush from Ten Sides.

Venting a Grievance

In 1916 Shen Zhaozhou compiled and published the score of the Yingzhou Ancient Tunes, containing forty-five pieces: twenty-two slow pieces such as Flying Flowers Touching the Green, seventeen fast pieces such as Venting a Grievance, five literary pieces such as Yearning for Spring, and one martial piece, Ambush from Ten Sides.

Yearning for Spring

In 1916 Shen Zhaozhou compiled and published the score of the Yingzhou Ancient Tunes, containing forty-five pieces: twenty-two slow pieces such as Flying Flowers Touching the Green, seventeen fast pieces such as Venting a Grievance, five literary pieces such as Yearning for Spring, and one martial piece, Ambush from Ten Sides.

Ambush from Ten Sides

In 1916 Shen Zhaozhou compiled and published the score of the Yingzhou Ancient Tunes, containing forty-five pieces: twenty-two slow pieces such as Flying Flowers Touching the Green, seventeen fast pieces such as Venting a Grievance, five literary pieces such as Yearning for Spring, and one martial piece, Ambush from Ten Sides.

03 · Regional Records & Related Items

Today the pipa playing art of the Yingzhou ancient-tune school of Chongming is famous throughout the country and has become one of the four pipa schools acknowledged by the music world. The repertory of the Yingzhou ancient-tune school consists mostly of small literary pieces, each of which describes one scene or one thing; they may be played independently or combined in a suite, which is unique among the pipa schools of China. The Yingzhou ancient-tune pipa takes the vigour and grandeur of the northern pipa school and the essence of the beauty and softness of the southern pipa school, forming a character that is enduring and plain, fresh and beautiful and setting it apart; it is one of the famous pipa schools of China.

Other submitting regions for the same item: Pipa Art · Pipa Art.

04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding

From that point on the Yingzhou ancient-tune school continually widened its influence in the course of transmission and became renowned throughout the country. At present the transmitters of Yingzhou ancient tune are growing ever fewer, reduced from more than thirty in the early years after the founding of the People's Republic of China to eight, of whom only one can play the suites. In this situation the rescue and protection of the pipa playing art of the Yingzhou ancient-tune school is extremely urgent and must be begun at once. Yin Rongzhu (as recorded in the official dossier of an associated inheritor): in 1984 she and Fan Boyan and Chen Gongze edited and compiled the Selected Pieces of Yingzhou Ancient Tunes, spreading the Yingzhou ancient-tune pipa pieces throughout the country and making them important material for pipa teaching and performance. Her playing has a fine, soft timbre, is good at expressing quiet, secluded and elegant feeling, and has a leisurely, delicate charm. Representative works include Flying Flowers Touching the Green and The Lament of Zhaojun. Female, Han, born in March 1941, died in November 2009, a native of Shanghai city. Representative inheritor of pipa art (Yingzhou ancient-tune school), a national-level intangible cultural heritage project in the third national-level batch.

05 · Associated Representative Bearers

Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:

06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography

Sources

China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)

Read the official ihchina.cn record ↗